Over the centuries, European artists depicted a variety of religious figures as African. The most famous examples: Christmas art of the Three Kings, or Magi. Many of these treasures can be found in The Image of the Black in Western Art, co-edited by David Bindam and Henry Louis Gates Jr., editor-in-chief of The Root.
It is something of a shock to discover that since classical antiquity, men and women of African descent have been a constant presence in European works of art. Just as startling, black people have often been depicted much more sympathetically than the historical relationship between sub-Saharan Africa and Europe would suggest.
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