Ottenberg Art Books in New Book Alcove

A small exhibit in the New Book Alcove highlights anthropologist Simon Ottenberg’s recent gift to Africana. Ottenberg studied at Northwestern with Africana founder Melville J. Herskovits in the 1950s before joining the faculty at the University of Washington in Seattle, from which he retired in 1991. His most recent book, Farmers and Townspeople in a Changing Nigeria, was published in 2005. The founder of the Arts Council of the African Studies Association, Ottenberg is also an art historian who has been deeply involved in the contemporary art scene of Nigeria since the 1960s and ‘70s, says Africana curator David Easterbrook. “What Esmeralda Kale and John Kannenberg selected to display in the New Book Alcove is a selection of works on art history that was a part of his gift,” David says, “but it also included a rich collection of Nigerian exhibition catalogs and 35 boxes of field work materials that are just invaluable.”

Exhibit poster by John Kannenberg