The Art of the Edo

Neatorama: "With this art, you can get a true feeling of Africa before the arrival of the European."

Uh, no.

None of these pieces comes even close to predating extended contact between the Edo and the Portuguese. But far, far preceding this contact with the caucasoid world is the regional influence of Islam, and just as far preceding that is the massive influence (to which each of these styles, most demonstrably the relief and the rooster sculpture) of the largely European Carthaginians, who introduced metallurgy to the region encompassing modern Nigeria as early as 500BC, significantly more than 2,000 years before you say the (evil?) Europeans "arrived."

Since every mention of an achievement of non-Europeans must be couched in a snide jab at the European peoples, I don't mind taking subjective license. In these photos, the art is removed from its equally earthen environment and set into a the contrasting context of a clinical, modern gallery. This profound juxtaposition pleases the beholder's eye more than the art, which is only striking in a subconsciously presumed abstract sense unintended by its creator.

The post was fluffy and inaccurate.

However, where did the Carthaginians learn matallurgy? From the Hittites and/or other Mesopotamian civilizations. Where is the oldest known ironwork? Egypt. Africa.

It's not a competition. Posts about the art or technology of a region don't have to eschew historicity to bestow a patronizing compliment on the progress of the indigenous people, and we can respond and correct the issues, without having to leap to the historical defense of dead whitish colored people.

this post is horribly racist.

Actually, Zeytoun, your point re: Hittites/Mesopotamians is fully congruent with my own thesis that 17th century Edo culture indeed has roots in that of Caucasoid peoples (to include these groups, as well as the Egyptians and later Arabs). For what it's worth, the earliest metallurgy dates to 40,000 BC in Spain, a much colder and more Nordic place at the time, long before it appears outside of Europe. Forgive my defense of my own kin, but I find myself quite lonely in objecting to the virtual rule that any reference to ancient extra-European accomplishment be delivered with a disparaging remark about Europeans. The favorite jab is to compare relatively recent mongoloid civilizations in Asia and the Americas to the simultaneous artificial depression of the European dark ages, conveniently forgetting the grandeur of Rome, Greece, and much earlier tribal technologies of central Europe, such as those found with the Nordic mummies of pre-China. If it's not a competition, then ask yourself why you only object to my defensiveness, and have never objected (be honest) to the undeniably incessant, PC assault on the achievements of us "whitish" creatures.

Nutjob.

(btw, by I used the term metallurgy too broadly. I was referring to specifically to iron and the iron age, as I thought you had been)

The world is full of the gamut of expressions. As such, it becomes a Rorschach test of sorts. Where I see disparaging remarks, but you see a conspiracy. The difference is I don't care about race, and you do.

Notice that you see my post as one-sided. When I actually chided both the original post, and yours, rather equally. Your perception is biased.

The crimes of one population(in this case colonial Europe of the 16-19th centuries)have nothing to do with the contributions of another (European contributions to African society). You're smart, but throwing a bunch of irrelevant points up to validate your own preconceived ideas.

And you've created a false dichotomy. The choice is not between shallow PC historical fluff, and semi historical racist rants.

I'm not going to read this thread anymore, so if you decide to have the last word, address everyone else. I won't be reading.

Cheers!

The article was pretty basic, and didn't really seem that well-written. It highlights the Edo culture in Nigeria, possibly to the exclusion of other states in that country, but I didn't see any other racism. Maybe I should have read closer. I didn't see anything in the link about "pre-European" art, so I assume it's Queuebot's mistaken interpretation.