(Western) art and its relation to modernism pose a problematic situation in that, on one hand, “art has come to function as the defining point of cultural achievement and civilization…clearly distinct from the danger and defilement represented by the Other…”; on the other hand, modernism challenges this thesis because it would seem to “posit the Other not as a threat but as a source of new energies” (Gikandi 458). At the same time, modernism creates a kind of surveillance, “routine maintenance”, on the type of art that can be allowed, and on the overall effects of the Other. The African can only be allowed as “the citadel of modernism”, if the object has been separated from the body. This idea of cleansing and purifying the Other seems to defy the very purpose of artists seeking the unknown for new sources, to awaken consciousness within people.

In addition, I would agree with Gikandi that it was merely the idea of primitivism that appealed to Picasso, for an idea can be interpreted and rationalized. But the African bodies and cultures posed a far greater danger, not only because they could “contaminate”, (Levine mentions how Britons were afraid to ‘go native’, and would send their children back to Britain to root out local culture), but also because they were “incomprehensible” (as Conrad describes in Heart of Darkness) – the Other could not be adequately represented and defined. Furthermore, the Other could possibly reflect a darker and unknown side of the colonizer, and this could threaten his very state of being.

In that sense, the relation between modernism and the Other, wavers between trying to represent consciousness and a deep-seated anxiety of the Other, between the African as an object of art divorced from its culture and the African as a living body. Even the very notion of “representing consciousness” is questionable. It’s as if modernism tries to delve into the Other, yet unable to do so, gives its audience its own version of the African. Yet, how can it still be called modern, if rather then test new grounds and find new ways of representing consciouness, there remains a need to survey and cleanse the Other, one key source of reference? Can Picasso’s art still be considered “modern”? And what is “modernism”? – if the term (1) seems to be indicate a rather Eurocentric view, which effectively eliminates the Other; (2) seems to suppress what it tries to express (that of "consciousness").