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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:The Carver in Africa: Individually Acclaimed Artist or Anonymous Artisan?
Author:Klopper, SandraISNI
Year:1993
Periodical:Social Dynamics
Volume:19
Issue:1
Period:June
Pages:39-51
Language:English
Geographic terms:Congo (Democratic Republic of)
Africa
Subjects:artisans
carving
Architecture and the Arts
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
About person:William Frederick Padwick Burton (1886-1971)ISNI
External link:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02533959308458542
Abstract:This paper explores a number of issues raised by William Burton's annotated photographs of professional artists (or craft specialists) taken at his mission station in Katanga province, former Belgian Congo (Zaire), in the 1930s. It focuses, in particular, on why Burton recorded the names of two carvers, one a chief, the other a court sculptor attached to the Nkulu chieftainship. The question raised by this decision leads the author to consider the relationship between indigenous consumer attitudes to African artists, and changing perceptions of the identity and status of these artists by foreign buyers and art historians since the early 20th century. In the course of this discussion the author draws attention to the fact that it is only in context-specific studies of patronage that meaningful attempts have been made to address the ways in which artists themselves have responded to the increasingly complex marketplace in which they now work. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum.
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