Overview

Art Jollof: A Theory of Freedom in Contemporary African Art is a bold philosophical intervention into how art is defined, produced, and valued in the twenty-first century. Emerging from Nigeria in 2024, Art Jollof proposes a radically open framework for artistic practice-one grounded in abstraction, chromatic intensity, embodied gesture, and a principled rejection of aesthetic hierarchy. Drawing its epistemology from the cultural logic of Jollof rice-one name, infinite variations, no authoritative recipe-this book develops a new theory of creativity based on freedom, plurality, and participation. Art is reimagined not as a professional specialization or institutional product, but as a universal human capacity: a mode of presence, sensation, and self-articulation. Moving between aesthetic philosophy, cultural analysis, and poetic reflection, Aliyu Aminu Ahmed advances what he terms a chromatic philosophy of art, in which color is treated as a form of knowledge, gesture as an epistemic act, and excess as an ethical position. Against minimalism, formal austerity, and conceptual dematerialization, Art Jollof affirms vibrance, saturation, and joy as legitimate philosophical and political modes of resistance. At once theoretical manifesto and cultural proposition, Art Jollof reframes African creativity not as peripheral to global art history, but as a generative and autonomous force capable of producing original aesthetic paradigms. It does not seek validation from established canons. It offers instead an invitation: to rethink what art is, who it is for, and what becomes possible when creativity is freed from the compulsion to justify itself.

Full Product Details

9798245351803

Table of Contents

Reviews

Author Information

Tab Content 6

Countries Available