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States but maintain their residency in the Caribbean. As we move into the 1990s the Caribbean creative spiral will consciously link artists of the Caribbean, such as Groupe Formaje of Martinique, with those in the United States, such as AFRICOBRA, with contemporary artists and institutions in Africa, creating the most compelling self-referent artistic current that has existed in recent history.

NOTES

1. For a discussion of the European search for gold and its consequences, see Eric Williams, From Columbus to Castro: The History of the Caribbean , revised edition (New York: Vintage Press, 1984), passim.
2. The Spanish, Portuguese, English, Dutch and French were the major players who ultimately built their economies on the slave trade.
3. Few agreements are reached on what constitutes the Caribbean. The Reagan administration included in its definition of the Caribbean Basin those countries that were ideologically aligned with President Reagan and Prime Minister Seaga of Jamaica. Some of the publications that recently influenced my thinking in the Caribbean are Gordon K. Lewis, Main Currents in Caribbean Thought (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 1983); Sidney W. Mintz and Sally Price, Caribbean Contrours [in italic] (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 1985); Stuart H. Surlin, "Values, Authoritarianism, and Alienation Among African-Oriented Jamaicans", Journal of Black Studies 19 (December 1988) pp. 232-249.
4. For a discussion of the Dogon concept of the beginnings of creation, see Marcel Griaule and Germaine Dieterlen, "The Dogon", African Worlds, Daryll Forde, ed. (London: Oxford University, 1970).
5. See citation in Janheinz Jahn, Muntu: An Outline of the New African Culture (New York: Grove Press, 1961), pp. 96-97.
6. Roy Seiber and Roslyn Adele Walker, African Art in the Cycle of Life (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of African Art, 1988), pp. 28-33.
7. Geoffrey Parrinder, Religion in Africa (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1969), p. 18.
8. Nevell S. Booth, "An Approach to African Religion" in African Religions: A Symposium (New York: NOK Publishers, 1977), pp. 6-7.
9. Denis Williams, Icon and Image: A Study of Scared and Secular Forms of African Classical Art (New York: New York University Press, 1974), pp.46-47.
10. John S. Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophies Garden City, New York: Anchor Books, 1970), p. 1. Cheikh Anta Diop, The Cultural Unity of Black Africa (Chicago: Third World Press, 1978).
11. Roy Sieber, "Some Aspects of African Religion in African Art," in African Religions: A Symposium, Op. Cit., p. 142.
12. Seiber and Walker, Op. Cit., passim.
13. George Kubler, The Shape of Time (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1962).
14. Jahn, Op. Cit., p. 169.
15. For a discussion of additional aesthetic concepts, see Robert F. Thompson, "Aesthetics in Traditional Africa", in Art and Aesthetics in Primitive Societies, Carol Joplin, ed. (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1971), p. 376.
16. For a selection of illustrations of works from Ancient Benin, see Bryna Freyer, Royal Benin Art In the Collection of the National Museum of African Art (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of Art, 1987), passim. Even a cursory review of one or more group exhibitions of works by African diasporic artists would in all probability support this conclusion.
17. See Denis Wiliams, Op. Cit., p.42.
18. Ibid.
19. Floyd W. Coleman, "A Perspective of Traditional African Art". Paper presented at a meeting of the Society of Ethnic and Special Studies, Edwardsville, Illinois, 1979.
20. For a discussion of the Gelede Society, see Henry J. Drewal. "Efe: Voiced Power and Pageantry", African Arts, (Winter, 1974), pp. 25-31.
21. Contemporary African and African American artists that this writer has interviewed over the past twenty years have almost universally mentioned musical improvisational techniques as an influence on their work, they associate improvisation with a specific type of design pattern.
22. For a survey of textiles and jewelry, see Roy Sieber, African Textiles and Decorative Arts (New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1972), passim.
23. See Errol Hill, "Carnival Drama and Contemporary Western Indian Theatre", abstract of a paper presented at the Eight Triennial Symposium on African Arts, June 14-17, 1989, Washington, D.C.
24. For a discussion of a number of categories of art that exhibit Vodun influenced images and designs, see Robert F. Thompson, "The Flash of Spirit: Haiti's Africanizing Vodun Art" in Ute Stebich, Haitian Art (New York: The Brooklyn Museum, 1977), pp. 27-35.
25. See Melvin J. Herskovits, "Afro-American Art", Encyclopedia of World Art, p. 152-153.
26. See Robert F. Thompson, Flash of the Spirit: African and Afro-