Caribbean Art

by Veerle Poupeye

Overview

The complex and colorful world of Caribbean art reflects the region's African, European, Asian, and native heritage. Despite the ethnic, linguistic, and political diversity of Caribbean artists, there is a cultural unity in their work that distinguishes it in the larger context of North American and Latin American art. Following a discussion of the pre-Columbian and colonial eras, the author describes how pioneering national art movements in the first half of the twentieth century helped to define an indigenous aesthetic, and how revolution, anti-imperialism, and race-consciousness in the turbulent sixties and seventies affected the face of art. There is a strong relationship between Caribbean popular culture and art, and the book explores the importance of African-Caribbean religions such as Voodoo, Santaria, and Rastfarianism, as well as the influence of Trinidad carnival, the Junkanoo masquerade of the Bahamas, and similar traditions. This wonderfully illustrated survey covers a wide range of artists who have lived and worked in the Caribbean, as well as those who have left the islands but whose background plays a significant role in their work, providing a compelling look at a great body of original and imaginative art.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780500203064
Publisher:	Thames & Hudson
Publication date:	05/17/1998
Series:	World of Art
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Veerle Poupeye is a Belgian-Jamaican art historian, curator, and critic. Previously executive director of the National Gallery of Jamaica, she now lectures at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts in Kingston, Jamaica, where she is based. She has written books, articles, and exhibition catalogue essays on Jamaican and Caribbean art and culture and contributed to the journalsSmall Axe, Jamaica Journal, Caribbean Quarterly, and the New West Indian Guide.

Table of Contents

Introduction 9

Chapter 1 Prehispanic and Colonial Art 27

Chapter 2 Decolonization and Creative Iconoclasm 53

Chapter 3 Modernism and Cultural Nationalism 70

Chapter 4 Popular Culture, Religion and the Festival Arts 103

Chapter 5 'Dangerously Close to Tourist Art' 140

Chapter 6 Political Radicalism, Abstraction and Experimental Art 156

Chapter 7 The Land, the Sea and the Environment 192

Chapter 8 The Personal and the Political 212

Chapter 9 The Caribbean Contemporary 238

Bibliography 279

List of Illustrations 289

Index 295

Editorial Reviews

Discusses the diverse work of some 100 Caribbean artists both indigenous and from the diaspora. Encompasses popular and "high" art from rural and urban cultures, and art with politically radical and religious associations. Contains chapters on prehispanic and colonial art, modernism and cultural nationalism, popular religion and the festival arts, anti-imperialism and race consciousness, nature, the self and other, and recent developments. Art from some 20 countries is represented in high-quality color and b&w illustrations. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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