By Christopher D. Roy, Professor of Art History at the University of Iowa. This extensive essay examines the history of the various peoples who live in present day Burkina Faso. Various crafting traditions are examined - furniture, pottery, jewelry, weaving - with particular attention to the masking traditions. There is also a cross-cultural comparative stylistic summary for the various peoples of the region - Mossi, Gurunsi, Bwa, Bobo, Marka-Dafing. Great ethnographic images. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

"A five-year investigation reveals that most West African terra-cotta sculptures are fakes that have fooled specialists, sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and ended up in some of the world's most prestigious museums." Article by Michel Brent, published in Archaeology Magazine in 2001. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

George Hughes was born in Ghana and works today as a faculty member in the art department of the University of Oklahoma. He regularly shows his work in England, Germany, the Netherlands, the U.S. and Ghana. His paintings are mostly executed in mixed media: acrylics, oils, spray paint, polyurethane enamels, fabric paint, oil pastels and found objects. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

Ousmane Sow is a Senegalese artist whose work has been well received and admired throughout the world. His web site provides an extensive overview of his life and works, with many photographs, video clips, interviews and writings. And also his children's drawings... [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

Compiled by Janet Stanley, National Museum of African Art Library, Smithsonian Institution Libraries. The reading list gives extensive annotations of each entry, and is being updated continually. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

"African Books Collective, founded, owned and governed by African publishers, seeks to strengthen indigenous African publishing through collective action and to increase the visibility and accessibility of the wealth of African scholarship and culture." [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

African studies books published by the Indiana University Press. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

Margaret Lippert is a children's books author and this is her web site. She has written a number of books based on multicultural folk tales, including some based on stories from Liberia. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

Smithsonian Libraries and Archives' African Art Research Guide. A select list of freely-available resources for students, teachers, and researchers to learn about African art. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]

"The 'Art and Oracle' exhibition presented African artifacts created to communicate with ancestors, spirits, and gods in order to obtain insight into human quandaries." The book by Alisa LaGamma, with an essay by John Pemberton III (2000), is a Metropolitan Museum of Art publication. Out of print, MetPublications makes it available as a free download. [posted: Mar 04, 2004]