Through African Eyes | Nelson Atkins

Through African Eyes: The European in African Art, 1500-Present

Portuguese sailors landed on the shores of West Africa around 1450. Strangers at first, Europeans became trading partners, settlers and eventually colonizers.

Once African countries regained their independence in the 1950s and 1960s, their perceptions shifted once again. African artists addressed these changing relationships, incorporating, rejecting and transforming elements of European cultures. You can now experience this fascinating history—for the first time—Through African Eyes.

An Acoustiguide multimedia tour, included with the ticket, accompanies the extraordinary exhibition, organized in seven thematic areas: Strangers and Spirits, Traders, Settlers, Spirituality and Tehcnology, Education, Colonizers, and Westerners.

Couple Walking the Dog by Thomas Ona Odulate — Thomas Ona Odulate (active 1900–1950, Yoruba culture, Nigerian). *Couple Walking the Dog*, 1935–1955. Wood, Paint. Fowler Museum at UCLA, Estate of William A. McCarty-Cooper. © Fowler Museum at UCLA. Photo: Denis Nervig.

This exhibition has been organized by the Detroit Institute of Arts. Generous support has been provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. In Kansas City the exhibition is supported by The Helzberg Fund for African Art.

Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this exhibition do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.