Primitive Art in Civilized Places: Second EditionWhat is so "primitive" about primitive art? And how do we dare to use our standards to judge it? Drawing on an intriguing mixture of sources-including fashion ads and films, her own anthropological research, and even comic strips like Doonesbury—Price explores the cultural arrogance implicit in Westerners' appropriation of non-Western art. "[Price] presents a literary collage of the Western attitude to other cultures, and in particular to the visual art of the Third and Fourth Worlds. . . . Her book is not about works of 'primitive art' as such, but about the Western construction 'Primitive Art.' It is a critique of Western ignorance and arrogance: ignorance about other cultures and arrogance towards them."—Jeremy Coote, Times Literary Supplement "The book is infuriating, entertaining, and inspirational, leaving one feeling less able than before to pass judgment on 'known' genres of art, but feeling more confident for that."—Joel Smith, San Francisco Review of Books "[A] witty, but scholarly, indictment of the whole primitive-art business, from cargo to curator. And because she employs sarcasm as well as pedagogy, Price's book will probably forever deprive the reader of the warm fuzzies he usually gets standing before the display cases at the local ethnographic museum."—Newsweek |
Contents
The Mystique of Connoisseurship | 7 |
The Universality Principle | 23 |
The Night Side of Man | 37 |
Anonymity and Timelessness | 56 |
Power Plays | 68 |
Objets dArt and Ethnographic Artifacts | 82 |
From Signature to Pedigree | 100 |
A Case in Point | 108 |
Afterword | 124 |
Afterword to the Second Edition | 127 |
Notes | 139 |
References Cited | 149 |
| 157 | |
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Common terms and phrases
aesthetic response African art African mask Alsop American André Watts anonymity anthropology appreciation art history art lovers art museums art objects artifacts Asmat authentic Bourdieu Bush Negro carved century chapter cited civilized Claude Lévi-Strauss collecting collectors commentators communal concept connoisseurs connoisseurship context critical cultural dance dealers discourse discussion display documented Edmund Carpenter ethnographic example exhibit exotic expression feelings Franz Boas galleries human idea imagination interpretation Inuit Kenneth Clark kind labels language Maroon art masterpieces meaning Michael Rockefeller Modern Art Musée Musée de l'homme Museum of Modern native nature Nelson Rockefeller non-Western notion original painting Paris particular perspective Picasso pieces popular present Price Primitive Art Primitive artists Primitivism produced recognized represents ritual Rockefeller role Rubin Saramaka sculpture sense sexual social status Suriname Susan Vogel symbolic taste tion tive tradition tribal twentieth-century understanding universal viewers village vision visual Western art words writing York