What’s on the West African Art poster
A definition and 6 facts worth remembering.
Sculpture, metal casting, textile and graphic systems developed across West Africa over more than two thousand years, with named workshops, court patronage and technical standards of their own.
- Nok terracotta, Nigeria, from about 500 BCE.
- Ife heads, 12th to 15th century, cast in brass.
- Benin plaques, lost wax, from the 13th century.
- Adinkra: an Akan symbol system with fixed meanings.
- Kente: strip-woven cloth, patterns with names.
- Bogolanfini: Malian mud cloth, dyed by hand.
- Nok — from about 500 BCE
- Ife casting — 12th to 15th century
- Ife heads were cast so finely that European scholars long refused to credit local aut…
Thousands of Benin objects were looted in the punitive expedition of 1897. Restitution to Nigeria is active and ongoing.
Questions about the West African Art poster
- What’s on the West African Art poster?
- A definition and 6 facts worth remembering. Sculpture, metal casting, textile and graphic systems developed across West Africa over more than two thousand years, with named workshops, court patronage and technical standards of their own. Nok terracotta, Nigeria, from about 500 BCE.; Ife heads, 12th to 15th century, cast in brass.; Benin plaques, lost wax, from the 13th century.; Adinkra: an Akan symbol system with fixed meanings.; Kente: strip-woven cloth, patterns with names.; Bogolanfini: Malian mud cloth, dyed by hand.; Nok — from about 500 BCE; Ife casting — 12th to 15th century; Ife heads were cast so finely that European scholars long refused to credit local aut…. Thousands of Benin objects were looted in the punitive expedition of 1897. Restitution to Nigeria is active and ongoing.
- Who is the West African Art poster for?
- West African Art belongs to the Art & Design section rather than to a school year, because design is not something one grade owns. Anyone learning art history can pin it up — a beginner, a student mid-course, or someone revising years later.
- When should you use the West African Art poster?
- Use it to correct the idea that European modernism discovered these traditions. A wall chart earns its place by being glanceable from where the work is happening, so West African Art belongs on the wall where that design work actually happens, within glancing distance, rather than filed away.
- What other posters go with West African Art?
- Abstract Expressionism, Arts & Crafts and Bauhaus sit alongside West African Art in the Art & Design section. Printed together they make a wall rather than a single sheet, which is how a reference set actually gets used.Abstract ExpressionismArts & CraftsBauhaus
- Is the West African Art poster free to download and print?
- Yes. West African Art downloads as a free PDF with no account, no email and no watermark, like everything else in the Art & Design section. Print as many copies as you like for a home, a classroom, a library or a tutoring group; reselling the file is the only thing the licence rules out.Read the licence
- What size does the West African Art poster print at?
- West African Art is a vector PDF laid out for US Letter, and prints on A4 with Fit to page — the same file, no separate download. Because every mark on it is drawn rather than photographed, it stays sharp enlarged to A3, A2 or A1 at a copy shop. Colour carries emphasis only, so a greyscale print of West African Art loses nothing.Printing guide
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