George Lilanga

George Lilanga was born among the Makonde, a people famous for their wood carving, in the Masasi district of southern Tanzania. He said he was born in 1934 in the village of Kikwetu, though one source gives 1935. He grew up carving and making clay figures and, like many Makonde artists, moved to Dar es Salaam, where carving for collectors had become a living. In the early 1970s he joined Nyumba ya Sanaa, the "House of Art" (now the Nyerere Cultural Centre), where artists were trained and their work sold; by one account he was first hired as a watchman there, until a staff member's interest in his carvings changed his duties, and he then added drawing and painting. Some sources say he co-founded the centre in 1973, but we have not seen that confirmed independently.

His first works were carvings of shetani, the spirit beings that Makonde sculptors had begun to invent in the 1950s (see Makonde art). Lilanga turned these spirits into his own world of figures: rubbery bodies with big ears, wide eyes and long fingers, dancing, playing music, gossiping and getting into trouble. He carried them from wood into painting, etching and painted panels, filling the surface with crowds in flat, bright colours. Behind the humour there is often commentary on daily life, money, health and politics in Tanzania.

A group exhibition of African artists in Washington, D.C., in which a large share of the works were his, made his name abroad; sources date it to 1978 or 1979 and one says 100 of the 280 works shown were his. Under the influence of the Tingatinga school he began producing colourful animal paintings around 1980. He later showed in Europe, Japan and the United States and in major surveys such as Africa Remix (2004), a show of 137 works by 88 artists from 25 countries initiated by Jean-Hubert Martin, who had curated Magiciens de la Terre in 1989. He died in Dar es Salaam in June 2005.

How to look at a Lilanga: follow the figures' limbs and ears, which carry the movement, and then read the lettering and small scenes that fill the gaps; the crowd is arranged so that every figure has something to do. This reading is the site's own. The Magnin-A gallery in Paris lists him among its artists, and auction houses such as Art Auction East Africa have sold his work; we have not confirmed a permanent museum display. His humorous, crowded style links him to Tanzania's other popular painting tradition, Tingatinga. See East African art.