Written by one of the foremost scholars of African art and featuring more than 125 color images, Postcolonial Modernism chronicles the emergence of artistic modernism in Nigeria in the heady years surrounding political independence in 1960.

List of Illustrations ix

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction. Postcolonial Modernism 1

1. Colonialism and the Educated Africans 21

2. Indirect Rule and Colonial Modernism 39

3. The Academy and the Avant-Garde 71

4. Transacting the Modern: Ulli Beier, Black Orpheus, and the Mbari International 131

5. After Zaria 183

6. Contesting the Modern: Artists' Societies and Debates on Art 227

7. Crisis in the Postcolony 259

Notes 291

Bibliography 313

Index 327