L’art contemporain africain a fait son entrée dans le système globalisé, d’abord par les manifestations artistiques, ensuite dans les maisons de vente. Depuis les années post-indépendances, une nouvelle vision de l’art contemporain africain a émergé avec l’avènement des discours postcoloniaux. Ces idées inédites ont entraîné une lecture différente de l’esthétique contemporaine africaine avec l’appui de certains commissaires d’exposition. Parallèlement, une vision de l’artiste « authentique » subsiste dans les manifestations et donne de l’artiste africain une image qui peut paraître quelques fois figée. Les artistes contemporains africains se retrouvent aujourd’hui dans une situation conflictuelle ; ils doivent soit se rapprocher des centres d’impulsion artistiques c’est-à-dire du marché de l’art occidental ou rester sur le continent africain et tenter par des initiatives diverses et variées d’intégrer un marché qui reste encore en occident. Les zones périphériques arrivent cependant peu à peu à se muter en centres d’impulsion mais restent pour le moment modestes.Avec l’avènement des nouvelles technologies, des opportunités s’offrent aux artistes des périphéries en termes d’usages mais aussi en tant que medium. Leur application pousse à la réflexion, et à une tentative de compréhension des enjeux qui se profilent pour l’art contemporain africain et des perspectives qu’il faudra entrevoir à travers le paradigme des postcoloniales studies et à travers l’avènement des technologies de l’information et des communication. Est-il possible de proposer de nouvelles approches pour promouvoir la diffusion de l’art contemporain africain à travers les dispositifs socio-techniques disponibles mais aussi à travers la gestion de l’information. ? Dans une première partie, cette thèse tente de montrer la diversité des arts de l’Afrique pour en comprendre la complexité aujourd’hui. Puis en analysant les liens qu’elle a eus avec l’occident, d’en comprendre l’histoire.Dans une seconde partie la place de l’identité de l’artiste africain mais aussi son positionnement puis les initiatives qui sont menées sur le continent permettront de mieux appréhender les enjeux et perspectives qui dans la troisième partie, permettront d’avoir un point de vue global sur ce qui régit aujourd’hui l’art contemporain africain. / The contemporary African art has made its entry into the globalized system, first through artistic exhibitions then in the auction houses. Since the 1960s’ a new vision of contemporary African art has emerged with the postcolonial discourse. These ideas have led to a different reading of the contemporary African aesthetic with the support of some curators. Meanwhile, a vision of the “authentic” artist remains in many European and American exhibitions. African artist give an image that can sometimes seem fossilized The contemporary African artists today find themselves in a situation, which can be source of conflicts. They can get close to the artistic centers pulse which means the Western art market or stay on the African continent and try by different initiatives to include a market which is still outlying areas like western countriesThe other areas however gradually mutate into centers pulse but remain modest for the time being. With the advent of new technologies, opportunities exist for artists from the third world in terms of use but also as media. Their application pushes the reflection, and then attempt to understand the challenges that lies ahead for contemporary African art and perspectives that will glimpse through the paradigm of postcolonial studies and through the advent of technologies of information and communication. Is it possible to suggest new approaches to promote the dissemination of contemporary African art through socio-technical devices available but also through information management? The first part, this thesis attempts to show the diversity of the arts of Africa to understand it’s complexity today. Then by analyzing the relationship it has with the West, to understand it’s history.The second part tries to understand the identity of the African artist but also its positioning and initiatives that are carried out on the continent will better understand the challenges and opportunities.The third part will give a point of view overall which today governs contemporary African art.

This thesis responds to the dearth of detailed studies of pioneering African modernists; and the need for fresh theoretical frameworks for the interpretation of their art. Building on recent scholarship that applies decolonisation as an epistemic framework, it argues that a productive decolonial discourse needs to consider concurrent forms of nationalism and cultural agency in both the anti/colonial and postcolonial periods. Central to this approach is an analysis of the aesthetic responses of artists to the experiences and legacies of colonialism. This thesis is grounded in a study of Malangatana Valente Ngwenya (1936-2011), Mozambique’s most celebrated artist. It draws substantially on archival material and rare publications, mostly in Portuguese. The artist’s career is located within changing social and political contexts, specifically the anti/colonial period, and the promise and collapse of the postcolonial revolutionary project, with the pervasive influence of the Cold War highlighted. Following the advent of globalisation, the artist’s role in normalising postcolonial relations with Portugal is foregrounded. Parallel to his contribution to Mozambican art and society, Malangatana features prominently in surveys of modern African art. The notion of the artist fulfilling divergent social roles at different points in time for evolving publics is linked to an analysis of his emergence as a composite cultural sign: autodidact; revolutionary; cultural ‘ambassador’; and global citizen. The artist’s decolonial aesthetics are positioned in relation to those of his pan-African peers, with four 6 themes elaborated: colonial assimilation; anti-colonial resistance; postcolonial dystopia; and the articulation of a new Mozambican identity. Key to this analysis is an elaboration of the concept of the polemic sign, initially proposed by Jean Duvignaud (1967), adapted here to interpret the artist’s predilection for composite visual signs that, in their ambivalence and often provocative significations, resist processes of definitive translation. It is argued that through a juxtaposition of disparate forms of signs, and the simultaneous deployment of semi-realist and narrative pictorial strategies, the artist develops a complex, eclectic and evocative aesthetic that requires critical and open-ended engagement. The thesis concludes with provocative questions regarding the extent to which the artist’s aesthetics reflect hegemonic national narratives, or act to unsettle these. of a new Mozambican identity. Key to this analysis is an elaboration of the concept of the polemic sign, initially proposed by Jean Duvignaud (1967), adapted here to interpret the artist’s predilection for composite visual signs that, in their ambivalence and often provocative significations, resist processes of definitive translation. It is argued that through a juxtaposition of disparate forms of signs, and the simultaneous deployment of semi-realist and narrative pictorial strategies, the artist develops a complex, eclectic and evocative aesthetic that requires critical and open-ended engagement. The thesis concludes with provocative questions regarding the extent to which the artist’s aesthetics reflect hegemonic national narratives, or act to unsettle these.

In this study, I hope to challenge the absolute belief in academia, which assumes that the perception of reality or visualities; in terms of culture, nature, truth and so on, by definition should be understood according to the Western philosophical character and genealogy as developed from a positivist paradigm. It seems to me, that the dominant methodological frameworks as I know them now, tacitly follow this scientific, quantitative, material, mechanical, positivist paradigm that draws from Western philosophical development and positions, pervasively held as the only basis for knowledge production. In turn, this philosophical position delegitimises any other epistemologies or methodological frameworks from elsewhere. In many cases, the methods of teaching and assessing subscribe, impose and perpetuate these same protocols as the only recognised epistemological and methodological approaches for critical inquiry inside tertiary educational institutions. By far, fine art as a discipline has inherited this epistemological position. To define this field in the context of decolonisation (meaning the undoing of colonisation), it requires us to look beyond disciplinary knowledge. This research is primarily an epistemological critique; and does not simply seek to “Africanise” the study of art, but to condemn the pervasive institutionalised cultural dominance. To frame my discourse, I have adopted an anti-colonial perspective, and a qualitative method to help define this phenomenon through a wide range of techniques. These include grounded theory; propositional logic; case study, narrative inquiry and auto-ethnography as possible tool for collecting, coding and analysing of data.

A dissertação tem como objeto de pesquisa obras de arte tradicionais de origem africana do grupo étnico Iorubá onde se encontra representado o corpo humano. Busco elucidar as causas sociais, históricas, filosóficas que possibilitaram as produções escultóricas artísticas que apresentam geralmente formas antropóides. / The dissertation has as object of research works of traditional art from Africa\'s Yoruba ethnic group where the representation of the human body. Seeking to explain the social, historical, philosophical causes that allowed the artistic sculptural productions usually feature anthropoid forms.

A dissertação tem como objeto de pesquisa obras de arte tradicionais de origem africana do grupo étnico Iorubá onde se encontra representado o corpo humano. Busco elucidar as causas sociais, históricas, filosóficas que possibilitaram as produções escultóricas artísticas que apresentam geralmente formas antropóides. / The dissertation has as object of research works of traditional art from Africa\'s Yoruba ethnic group where the representation of the human body. Seeking to explain the social, historical, philosophical causes that allowed the artistic sculptural productions usually feature anthropoid forms.

This essay is a study of Yinka Shonibare MBE, London-born and Nigerian-raised contemporary artist, and his recent photographic practice that includes three series: Fake Death Pictures, William Morris Family Album, and Medusa. Exploration of the series reveals insight into Shonibare’s unique relationship to photography, in which he employs the hyper-realism and theatricality of the medium to interact with individuals from British history and reveal contemporary social and political injustices.

Esta dissertação, de caráter ensaístico e cartográfico, acompanha dimensões da arte contemporânea africana a partir de estudo de cinco criadores do continente africano participantes do Festival de Arte Contemporânea Sesc_Videobrasil, realizado na cidade de São Paulo, entre 2011 e 2018. O repertório composto evidencia desafios e possibilidades para a constituição de poéticas e sensibilidades extraocidentais, reunindo criações que expressam diversas formas de deslocamento e destacam a intensa circulação entre mundos como parte importante da assinatura africana. De modo polifônico, as produções de Dan Halter, Bouchra Khalili, Bianca Baldi, Michael MacGarry e Karo Akpokiere sublinham a complexidade dos universos estéticos de criações africanas, ao mesmo tempo que questionam prescrições sobre diferenças culturais, regimes de fronteiras e narrativas hegemônicas que impulsionam a captura das imaginações. Sinalizam um campo multifacetado, em plena ebulição e construção, que se desdobra na necessidade de pluralização de referenciais, a fim de desconstruir assimetrias de poder, gerando novas experiências políticas e estéticas. / This dissertation, of an essayistic and cartographic character, describes the characteristics of contemporary African art, based on the study of five creators from the African continent who took part in the Sesc_Videobrasil Festival of Contemporary Art, in the city of São Paulo, between 2011 and 2018. The program shows the challenges and possibilities for the formation of non-Western poetics and sensibilities, bringing together creations that express diverse forms of displacement and highlight the intense circulation among worlds as an important African characteristic. The productions of Dan Halter, Bouchra Khalili, Bianca Baldi, Michael MacGarry and Karo Akpokiere polyphonically underline the complexity of Africa\'s aesthetic universes and question prescriptions on cultural differences, boundary regimes, and hegemonic narratives that drive the capture of the imagination. They signal a multifaceted field which is in full construction and unfold in the need to change references so that the asymmetries of power can be deconstructed into new political and aesthetic experiences.

Thesis (M.A.) - Carleton University, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 91-97). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

Dissertation (DPhil)--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

Esta dissertação constitui-se de um estudo da cultura material de origem africana em que se investiga a produção, circulação, utilização e descarte de objetos africanos e afro-inspirados, aos quais eventualmente no Brasil agregam-se novos significados. Tratamos particularmente de duas produções características dos iorubás: as máscaras gueledé e os edan ogboni. Alguns desses objetos constam em coleções no Brasil, e seu uso em cultos religiosos afro-brasileiros do Recôncavo Baiano, no passado, é mencionado na literatura especializada. Na Nigéria e no Benim as máscaras de madeira denominadas gueledé e as estatuetas de liga de cobre edan são insígnias de duas importantes instituições tradicionais dos iorubás: a associação Gueledé e a associação Ogboni, respectivamente. Esses objetos estão associados a entidades espirituais (Iyami e Onilé) que segundo a cosmogonia desse povo são as grandes mães ancestrais da humanidade. Alguns pesquisadores se valem da presença desses artefatos no Brasil para fundamentar a hipótese da reestruturação dessas instituições iorubás no Recôncavo Baiano, no final do período colonial. Outros autores, indo além, associam a suposta \"sociedade Ogboni brasileira\" com episódios das revoltas dos malês. Tomando-se a análise do ciclo de vida desses artefatos como instrumental metodológico, verificamos, no entanto, que o aparecimento dessas peças aqui no Brasil pode ter se dado não por causa da transplantação dessas instituições tradicionais africanas, mas por questões ligadas à permanência dos aspectos mais profundos da cosmologia iorubá dentro dos próprios terreiros de candomblé, e também pela disputa por reconhecimento e poder entre os mais antigos deles, evidenciando a potencialidade que esses artefatos têm de transmissão e preservação da memória coletiva de um terreiro. Neste estudo, além do ciclo de vida das peças, levam-se em consideração aspectos morfológico e tecnológicos da produção desses artefatos, em que se incluem os espaços que lhes são associados, bem como aspectos do universo simbólico que deu sentido a essas peças e animou seu ciclo de vida. / This dissertation results from a study of the material culture of African origin, in which the manufacture, circulation, use and discard of African and African-inspired objects are investigated. Two kinds of characteristic yoruba production are focused: the geledé masks and the edan ogboni statuettes. Some of these objects are found in Brazilian collections, and their use in Afro-Brazilian religious cults in Recôncavo Baiano in the past is mentioned in the experts\' writings. In Nigeria and Benin the wooden masks called geledé and the cooper alloy statuettes edan are insignia of important traditional yoruba institutions: the Geledé Association and the Ogboni Association, respectively. These objects are associated to spiritual entities (Iyami and Onile) who, according to the cosmology of this people, are the great ancestor mothers of the humankind. Some researchers allege the presence of these artefacts in Brazil in order to prove the hypothesis of reestructuring of those yoruba institutions in Recôncavo Baiano at the end of the colonial period. Other authors go even further, associating this supposed Brazilian Ogboni Association to the Malê rebellion (1809). Using the analisys of the life cycle of those artefacts as a methodological tool, we found that the apparition of those objects here in Brazil may be due not to the transplantation of those traditional African institutions, but to issues linked to the permanence of the most profound aspects of yoruba cosmology inside the own terreiros de candomblé, and also to the dispute for recognizement and power among the oldest of them, so showing the potential these artefacts have to transmit and preserve the collective memory of a terreiro. In this study, in addition to the life cycle of those pieces, morphological and technological aspects of their production are considered, including also the spaces which are associated to them, as well as aspects of the symbolic universe which provide meaning to these objects and animated their life cycles.