Audiences of nineteenth- and twentieth-century African art can frequently be found pressing their noses up against museum-cabinet glass trying to find a better view of the object. This is because one of the most exciting aspects of African sculptural work is the complex surface detail. Even more aggravating for the viewer, the exhibition label often features a non-descript text noting that the work is made of “wood and organic matter.” But what is it? Surely the museum tested the object to identify these different sculptural surfaces. Editors Leonard Kahan, Donna Page, and Pascal James Imperato seek to placate the audience’s curiosity in Surfaces: Color, Substances, and Ritual Application on African Sculpture. Combining reliable reference material and a number of compelling case studies, Surfaces calls attention to the wide range of exterior treatments accumulated around African art objects.

The seven essays in the volume are organized such that the first two chapters introduce background material, the next three chapters present specific case studies, and the final two chapters work as technical reference essays. In the book’s 524 pages, technical analysis prevails as it governs the first two chapters, the last two chapters, and corresponding appendices. Altogether, the volume is a collection of tactics of surface analysis that describes important precedents in the field of African art history.

In “Historical Background,” the first of two essays he contributes to the book, Leonard Kahan introduces the historical interest inherent in the study of surfaces in African art objects, while also including relevant vocabulary terms. He begins with the earliest roots of Western European primitivism and then documents the increasing attention to surface treatment in artworks as later modernist movements emerged, including Dada and Abstract Expressionism. Within this history, Kahan asserts that twentieth-century Conceptual art grew in tandem with greater scholarship in the field of anthropology. This incantation of anthropology initiates for Kahan a description of how, through an analysis of surfaces of African sculpture, the reader will encounter contrasting worldviews, such as the ways in which tradition, art, time, and aesthetics hold different meanings in the West and in Africa. Most importantly among the definitions he presents, Kahan seeks to make distinctions between the popular use of terms such as luminosity, patina, color, age, and “tradition.” These terms are well presented and are a solid reference guide for art-historical writers.

Donna Page’s essay, entitled “Agents of Transformation,” provides a review of literature that discusses surface treatment across a wide body of African art objects. Like Kahan, her strength is in a highly structured breakdown of vocabulary terms and processes. Within her larger analysis of the possible items applied to or layered onto a piece of art, Page incorporates ideas of artists and collaborators, the selection of different types of wood, and carving methods—all in order to describe more precisely the process of surface preparation and accumulation. She cites over one hundred different publications she used to compile her analysis. Page effectively brings these concepts to the foreground as these citations are often culled from scant information not emphasized in the original sources.

Three short case studies are, with good reason, at the heart of Surfaces. Impatient readers may choose to forgo the significantly broader essays, but they are strongly advised to look through this central material. One of Imperato’s finest art-historical essays appears in the volume as the third chapter. Imperato has been practicing medicine in Mali for almost fifty years, and was publishing on Bamana art by 1970. His essay, “Surface Symbols: The Meanings of Color, Patina, Encrustation, and Design on Bamana Sculpture,” offers a compelling overview of Bamana sculpture with an emphasis on surface treatment. For audiences familiar with the wider scholarship on Malian sculpture, this is an engaging essay as Imperato, albeit indirectly, offers his opinions on essays and books by a number of fellow authors writing about Bamana art. He notes the ideas he finds plausible and questions a number of popular hypotheses. His contribution is both an excellent synopsis as well as an informative introduction to Bamana art.

Charles Bordogna’s discussion in “Ibeji Surface Analysis” and Bolaji Campbell’s separate chapter entitled “Coloring the Orisa” are also commendable case studies. Bordogna analyzes the beliefs surrounding the frequently well-worn Ibeji, and describes different possible practices involving these sculptural twin figures. The chapter is concise and nicely written. Campbell’s essay further contributes to the study on Yoruba art by analyzing the paint applied as a means to renew sculpture and shrines for the orisa. Campbell provides a thoughtful analysis of contemporary Yoruba perspectives on chromatic meaning. That is, Campbell considers the long-invoked terms “awo pupa, awo dudu” and “awo funfun,” and seeks to imbue these “hot, earthy and cool tones” with expanded signification.

Chapter 6, Kahan’s “Surface Conditions of Wood Sculpture,” provides an outline of possible surface treatments of nineteenth- and twentieth-century wooden sculpture. These include the intended applications of materials such as pigments and oil, or material later forming an encrusted surface on a work of art. Throughout this analysis, Kahan’s insights on off-beat topics are the most insightful. Among his examples, Kahan’s examinations of fungus, decay, and breakage present some very original points that merit closer attention from scholars.

The final chapter in the volume, Donna Page’s a “Compendium of Substances,” reads as a dictionary of possible surface types and substances that have accumulated on nineteenth- and twentieth-century African sculpture. Page provides the popular and formal names of close to 150 surface elements and describes their properties. This section gets to the nitty gritty, quite literally. The descriptions of items such as “animal products” and “blood” are probably too brief considering the complexity of these types of application. However, the discussion of different wood types is extremely useful for art historians, collectors, conservators, and students pursuing answers to specific research questions.

This begs the question: who is the intended audience for this edited resource? The three central case studies seem to have a different audience from the framing content; their arguments, language, and topics will appeal to wide audiences, and this reviewer highly recommends these three chapters for readers new to the study of African art. They will appeal especially to undergraduate students or scholars interested in fresh directions regarding well-represented topics. The first two and the final two chapters of the volume, on the other hand, are intended for those training in the conservation of art, specifically nineteenth- and twentieth-century African art. Their use of scientific terms and their intensive organizational structure offer little opportunity for a reader to come upon her or his own exciting insights concerning a sculptural surface. Rather, they offer a checklist that a conservator might undertake in order to thoroughly prepare a report on the object.

Surfaces may be too exclusionary to nineteenth- and twentieth-century African art. This is surprising because some of the most gripping issues confronted by the book’s art conservationists certainly apply to art derived from other areas of the world; Asian, Southeast Asian, and Pacific art comes to mind, as well as the arts of the African diaspora, which all feature similarly complex surfaces. It seems unlikely that most conservators specialize only in one field, such as nineteenth- and twentieth-century African art. Beyond this, many twenty-first-century audiences appear to be increasingly curious about global relationships in surface treatment. The volume does describe relationships between items imported to Africa from Europe, but more could be said about the trade from Southeast Asia, for example. Even just a few broader speculations on these connections would be welcome.

Notably, however, Surfaces presents many excellent color photographs of important works of nineteenth- and twentieth- century African art. The majority of these objects are located in private collections or are in smaller museums located outside of large urban centers. Therefore, Surfaces presents a rare opportunity to view truly spectacular work that rivals objects in some of the most celebrated museum collections. Overall, Surfaces features a great deal of reference material and will be a volume that many scholars and students cite in the decades to come when dealing with surface composition.