Cement sculpture in West Africa is a twentieth-century art form and often appears quite modern, but wherever it occurs, invariably it springs from earlier traditions: Igbo mbari shrines, Asafo monuments, Akan or Ibibio tomb sculptures. The continuities, however, are not hard to discern. The medium of cement offers a durability and permanence that mud or terracotta lacks and is seen as appropriate for works usually associated with or made to be placed in funerary or commemorative contexts.

The bulk of this volume deals with the sculptors Sunday Jack Akpan and Aniedi Okon Akpan, whose life-sized painted cement sculptures have a startling realism and dramatic impact, which is magnified and intensified when one visits the artists' workshop in southeastern Nigeria and sees dozens of these animated human and animal figures assembled in the yard. The originality and inventiveness of their work is apparent, but it did not spring from nothing. The forms and images may be new, but Ibibio funerary and commemorative sculpture has a long history. The Akpans have merely expanded the repertoire with their unique contributions. The skilled craftsmanship with which they translate a two-dimensional photograph or portrait (from which they often work) into a three-dimensional work is itself a remarkable artistic achievement.

There are numerous photographs of the Akpans' sculptures and their workshop, plus thirty-three color plates, reproduced in the book. Two essays on the work of the Akpans by Thomas Deecke and Ronald Ruprecht comprise the main text.

The summer of 2012 saw a grand celebration of West African art in Manchester, England, otherwise known as Cottonopolis, harking back to its textile industrial base. Thirty-three artists participated along with musicians and other actors. The exhibition was held at the Manchester City Galleries, the Whitworth Art Gallery and the Gallery of Costume, Manchester, England, June 2-September 16, 2012.