Footnotes

Gerard Sekoto travelled to Dakar in 1966 with his friend, the Brazilian artist Wilson Tiberio, to attend the Congress of Negro Artists. It's unclear what exactly Sekoto's expectations were for this trip, however the various diaries and journals that Sekoto kept suggest that his experience in Senegal was mixed. The popularity of Islam, and the difficulty understanding the French dialect exaggerated his feeling as a tourist and outsider in Senegal. On one occasion, Sekoto noted how Leopold Senghor left Sekoto his car so that they could visit the Casamance region in Southern Senegal.

"This part is called Casamance, where people have remained in their old African customs. They are much more welcoming to foreigners and are living in various ethnic groups with their vernacular dialects. They would go out of their way to do well to a visitor, but without the intention to extract material gain. In this way they differed much from those people in big cities."

Sekoto spent two months in Casamance and frequently sketched in biro the various dances and ceremonies that he was invited to.

"This is a particular dance of the women in Casamance. There was a gathering over the death of a young man bitten by a snake. A cow and a bull were sacrificed with a few chickens during this dance of the women. The whole ceremony lasted a day and a great part of the night. All the gestures and structures in the build of these people are very different from our women in South Africa."

Although Sekoto had left Senegal by the time that the present lot was executed in 1975, it's clear that his time in Casamance had a profound influence on his work. It was common for Sekoto to produce works from both his memory and sketches of Senegal throughout the rest of his career.

Bibliography
Barbara Lindop, Sekoto: The Art of Gerard Sekoto, (Lonson: Pavilion, 1995), pp. 24-25.
Barbara Lindop, Gerard Sekoto, (Randburg: Dictum, 1998), pp. 38-39.