256 pages
Author : Mary H. Nooter, Susan Vogel, Allen F. Roberts, Suzanne Preston Blier and others.
86 Catlogue items, mostly in color, + dozens of field and supporting photos in color and b/w.>br>
The book explores how art both structures and selectively disseminates secret knowledge in Africa. The book and the exhibition it accompanies make two main points : first, art is intimately related to knowledge in Africa, being fundamental to processes of teaching and revelation that confer status and disclose information, meanings and symbols; and second, secrets are often essential to the making, ownership, use and interpretation of art. The essays in the book - by 13 Africanist scholars of diverse intellectual orientations - explore relationships among art, secrecy, knowledge and power in African societies.