Senegalese painters

Modern Senegalese painting was born with independence. In 1960 Papa Ibra Tall and Iba N'Diaye, both trained in Paris, set up the art section of Dakar's new national school of fine arts. Tall, close to President Senghor, led the École de Dakar, whose painters and tapestry weavers gave visual form to Négritude; N'Diaye, more independent, painted sheep at the Tabaski feast, jazz musicians and great expressionist canvases, and insisted that African painters owed nothing to anyone.

From the 1970s a new generation reacted against the official style. Issa Samb, painter, performer and philosopher of the Laboratoire Agit'Art, worked in his famous courtyard in Dakar; Viyé Diba built paintings from collage and found materials; Kre M'Baye, Ismaïla Manga, Ibrahima Kébé and Ndoye Douts, with his painted cities, carried painting forward, while sous-verre glass painting kept a popular tradition alive. These are Senegal's painters, most looked-up first. See also Senegalese artists and Ousmane Sow.