More African Art
Tanit, a Phoenician moon goddess
(Carthage)
Beginning about 800 BC, there started to be a lot more contact between West Asian and European people and African people. African artists became interested in West Asian and European art styles and changed their own art to reflect these new ideas, while some West Asian and European artists came to live in Africa and worked there in their own styles. This movement began in North Africa (modern Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya), where Phoenician traders established the city of Carthage about 800 BC.
Then about 50 BC, Roman colonists began to settle in North Africa, conquering and ruling both the original Africans and the Phoenician colonists. In 30 BC, the Romans also conquered Egypt. Until about 400 AD, the Romans ruled North Africa. African artists far beyond the borders of the Roman Empire, as far south as Meroe (modern Ethiopia and Sudan), saw imported Roman artworks and used Roman ideas in their own work.
Glass beads from India (ca. 300 AD)
At the same time, traders from the Arabian peninsula also began to trade up and down the coast of East Africa. By 300 AD, traders were selling Indian glass beads in Kenya. Traders also crossed the Sahara to bring Indian glass beads to West Africa.
Upemba pot from the Congo, ca. 1000 AD
But in South Africa and in Central Africa (modern Congo), African artists didn't see much West Asian or Roman art, and they continued to develop their own independent artistic ideas. In Central Africa, beginning around 400 AD, the Upemba people formed a complex chiefdom and then a state organized around the Congo River. Their hand-made pottery vases and bowls are distinctly African, with their sharp carinations (turns) and incised decoration.
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