Arts by region

African art reflects the diversity of African cultures. The oldest existing art from Africa are 6,000-year old carvings found in Niger, while the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt was the world's tallest architectural accomplishment for 4,000 years until the creation of the Eiffel Tower. The Ethiopian complex of monolithic churches at Lalibela, of which the Church of Saint George is representative, is regarded as another marvel of engineering.

The term African dance refers mainly to the dances of subsaharan Africa. The music and dances of northern Africa and the Sahara are generally more closely connected to those of the Near East. Also the dances of immigrants of European and Asian descent (e.g. in South Africa) are not covered by this article.

African dance has to be viewed in close connection with African Music.

A central trait of African dance is that it is polycentric. This means that - unlike many other regions of the world - the body is not treated as a "stiff" unit but is segmented into several centers of movement (shoulders, chest, pelvis, arms, legs etc.) that may be moved according to different rhythmical components of the music or even add rhythmical components of their own. This may result in very complex movements "inside" the body, as opposed to the movement through space of the whole body that plays the most important role in many European choreographies.