Angélique Kidjo will perform this Saturday (Oct. 1st) at The Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium in NYC. The Grammy Award-winning singer/songwriter's concert is in conjunction with The Metropolitan Museum of Art's exhibit: "Heroic Africans: Legendary Leaders, Iconic Sculpture."
We're particularly excited about this exhibit because, much to the delight of post-modernists everywhere (Kwame Anthony Appiah), it promises to "challenge conventional perceptions of African art." In short, African art is not to be judged against some Western benchmark.
A New York Time's review of the exhibit offers hope that the this is indeed true:
"...it argues, through demonstration, against basic misunderstandings surrounding this art. African art has no history? No independent tradition of realism? No portraiture? All African sculpture looks basically alike, meaning “primitive”? African and Western art are fundamentally different in content and purpose? Wrong across the board."
Click here for more information on the concert event. The exhibit will run through January 29th.
