Atta Kwami: September 14, 1956-October 6, 2021

Atta Kwami was a man of great kindness, courtesy, and clear-headedness, qualities manifested in his art, as in his person; and my epigraph sort-of encapsulates his significant place in thinking through an art history for Africa. Thus it is, in sorrow, that we commemorate his passing through this world, and through our lives: in sorrow at his departure—but also in joy as we remember his legacy. For Atta was a painter and printmaker who brought his vision of Ghana into an international art world¹ (see Basciano 2021), and a designer and maker of things such as his artist's book about his mother, and his kiosks and archways that fall between various categories of art-making; and he was a university teacher, a well-published scholar (most especially Kumasi Realism [2013] based upon his PhD thesis), an active participant in Triangle workshops² (including Shave, Somerset, England, 1994; Tenq, Senegal, 1995;...