Customer Reviews

Patterns That Connect: Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art

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Forget the content, which is interesting enough in itself. I'm neither an ethnographer, nor an anthropologist; but the sheer beauty of the stippled and line drawings make this surely one of the most beautiful books produced in the last decade of the twentieth century. If you can't get to see a copy in the flesh, you will scarcely understand. The contents are summed up in the sub-title - indeed this is what Schuster and Carpenter's point is, that tribal and ancient artifacts contain the genealogy of the creators of these artifacts, whether or not the craftsman still remembers or knows of his tradition. I have personal story in confirmation of their thesis. I have a tribal work, which I interpreted along their lines. I then had written confirmation from the craftsman responsible for the work that my surmise; taken in toto from Shcuster and Carpenter was correct. Nevertheless, I'll repeat my view, that for the breathtaking beauty of the drawings alone, this book deserves a wide public.

Every artist, educator and scholar should have a copy of this book. It is Brilliant.

Reading this book, I was amazed at how much cultures had in common when it came to tribal art and design. This is a great book to start out with when learning about the ancient world. Each culture whether it be African, Asian, Hispanic, European, Middle Eastern, etc has something to offer. The book is a great way to understand the beliefs of others (Gods, Family, Social Order) I bought this book in search of South American tattoos, but also learned about their superstitions, duality, clothing, weapons, etc. The illustrations are very good and give the sense that great effort and reserch was put into this book!