A rare Pablo Picasso exhibition on show in Senegal's capital
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Loading... - Obama Wamaitha
- 04 Apr 2022
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An unprecedented Picasso exhibition opened this week in Senegal’s capital Dakar, where about a dozen of the Spanish master’s works are displayed alongside African art, from which he drew inspiration.
A pioneering modern artist who died in France in 1973, Picasso left behind a vast and influential body of work including paintings, sculptures and ceramics.
AFRICA’S INFLUENCE ON PABLO PICASSO’S ART
He was one of the founders of the Cubist movement and was heavily inspired by African art, with the influence notable in seminal paintings such as Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.
However, Picasso’s interest in Africa remains relatively unknown in Senegal.
El Hadji Malick Ndiaye, an art historian and one of the curators of the Dakar exhibition, said that every African should be proud of how the continent’s art had inspired Picasso.
"Visitors should leave with “a sense of pride in what the continent’s artists have given, and in the diversity of styles that have generated new forms and nourished modern art,” he said.
El Hadji Malick Ndiaye
The exhibition sees about 15 of Picasso’s works hosted in Dakar’s Museum of Black Civilisations, on loan from Paris. Alongside them are displayed works of African art, such as otherworldly traditional masks, which so fascinated the influential artist.
NOT THE FIRST PABLO PICASSO EXHIBITION IN DAKAR
According to the exhibition curators, Picasso’s interest in African art began with a 1907 visit to the Trocadero Ethnological Museum in Paris, which has since closed.
The same year, he painted Les Demoiselles d’Avignon – which features five female nudes, two of whom are depicted with faces that bear striking similarities to traditional African masks.
A study of the painting is on display in Dakar, paired with an African mask appearing to depict a whistling face.
Cecile Debray, the president of the Picasso Museum in Paris, described Picasso as having a “very relaxed relationship to his sources,” mixing Romanesque, Iberian and African influences.
The Spanish artist, drawn by the novelty of non-Western artistic traditions, is known to have collected masks and statues from both Africa and Oceania for his studio. Read More…
