Tingatinga painting

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Tingatinga is the name of an art form of painting that originated in Tanzania in the 1960s and named after its founder, Edward Saidi Tingatinga (1932–1972) .

history

In the 1960s, Tingatinga began to work as an unemployed person using bicycle paint to paint animals, plants and village scenes on square press plates. The square format typical for the early years resulted from the intention to fully utilize the standard sizes of the press plates. Relatives and friends took up the art form, passed it on and let new developments flow in. They ensured that the Tingatinga painting developed into a cultural reality after the sudden death of its founder - he was accidentally shot by a police patrol in 1972.

Scandinavian development workers became aware of Tingatinga's works in the late 1960s and early 1970s and organized an extensive exhibition of Tingatinga's works in cooperation with the responsible authorities (National Development Corp., National Arts Company) during an international trade fair that took place for the first time in Dar es Salaam in 1971 , which helped the art form to break through and Tingatinga to a secure income. Tingatinga was able to sign a contract with the National Development Corporation with the obligation to deliver images every week at a fixed price that was well above the market price at the time. The results of a slowly matured idea of ​​Tingatinga, sometimes also referred to as "square or lacquer painting", became socially acceptable and achieved ever higher prices.

Artist

After the first profitable sales successes, the first students registered with Tingatinga. Initially, these were his younger brother Simon Mpata, his cousin Kasper Henrick Tedo and the son of a cousin Ajaba Abdallah, all from the same Makua tribe as close relatives. Soon January joined John Linda and Adeusi Mandu Matambwe, both of the Makonde tribe to which Tingatinga's wife Agatha belonged. These five first students formed the "first generation of Tingatinga painters". In addition, Omari Amonde was the only other student whom Tingatinga accepted afterwards.

After Tingatinga's death in 1972, the group decided to take on other painters as students. The painters of this “first generation” became the teachers of the “second generation of Tingatinga painters”. Simon Mpata, who did not agree to the expansion of the group, left Dar and went to Nairobi, Kenya.

This second generation of painters decided to work and perform as a group and meet every day under the baobab tree near the Morogoro stores to paint and sell, which attracted them more attention. In order to strengthen the cohesion, Salum Mussa ("Mzee Lumumba"), also a relative of Tingatinga, campaigned for the establishment of an official "partnership" and dedicated himself to maintaining it. In 1977 the "Tingatinga Partnership" was founded. Its members were:

  1. Salum Mussa ("Mzee Lumumba")
  2. Hashimu Mruta
  3. Omari Amonde
  4. Saidi Mohamed Chilamboni
  5. Zaburi (Z.) Chimwanda
  6. Hassani Kamale
  7. Mwidadi Awazi (Mruta's younger brother)
  8. Rajabu Chiwaya
  9. Abdul Mkura (Amonde's brother)
  10. Adeusi Mandu
  11. Sky Issa
  12. John Kainne
  13. Rashid Milanzi
  14. Abbas Wasia Mchisa
  15. Japhary nasombe
  16. Philipo Milanzi

The second generation of Tingatinga painters also includes Omary Adam, Jaffari Aussi, Damian Msagula and Mohamed Wasia Charinda (Abbas Wasia Mchisa's younger brother).

After the founding of the “Partnership”, the group grew steadily, by 1979 there were 42 members. Some artists also left the group to work independently (Msagula, Jaffary, David Mzuguno) or to form independent new groups, the most important of which still exist today in the Village Museum and the Slipway in Dar, as well as one founded later in Bagamoyo.

After the end of socialism in Tanzania, the "Tingatinga Arts Cooperative Society (TACS) Ltd." was finally founded in 1990. Today (2017) it has 63 official members. Several relatives and students of the members also work under the joint roof of the workshop building built in 1996 by the Swiss NGO Helvetas, some of them now outside in a covered area, as the interior space has become too narrow for the approx. 100 painters. The "second generation" is now the teacher of the third.

The most important and, in recent years, most successful representatives of the TACS include:

Tingatinga's only son, Daudi Tingatinga (1966-2015), Mohamed Charinda (* 1947), Abdul Mkura (* 1954), Mbwana Sudi (1961-2014), Stephen Mkumba (* 1963), Abdallah Saidi Chilamboni (* 1969), Agnes Mwidadi Mpata (* 1968) Saidi Omary (1979-2017) and Mwamedi Chiwaya (* 1979).

In addition to the artists who are organized in groups, there is a large number of independent painters who try to sell their works in the streets of Dar (especially on the cul-de-sac to the TACS), as well as in the country's tourist centers and on Zanzibar. The quality varies greatly.

A well-known Tingatinga artist who emerged from the school in the Village Museum is John Kilaka (* 1966). He was best known for his imaginatively illustrated picture books.

Characteristic

Tingatinga painting deals with forms that the East African cultural area has developed over centuries. In terms of motifs, she processes everyday scenes as well as rituals and deals with topics that are important for today's Tanzania. Magic and sorcery occupy an important place as cultural phenomena that are rooted and present in Tanzanian everyday reality.

Animal representations can be found even more frequently - not infrequently in quiet scenes - which are embedded in Tanzanian or imaginary landscapes. Sometimes animals can be assigned to both ostensibly real and symbolic areas of life at the same time. The parts of the face of the animals depicted are often reminiscent of the formal language of the masks and thus integrate painting into a long-standing cultural tradition.

Certain motifs have appeared again and again since the beginning of Tingatinga painting. Many pictures are characterized by an impressive simplicity, without slipping into the " naive ": " Their coloring is too individual, their composition schemes too lively, their lines too distinctive and rhythmic ." Later, forgeries were painted of all known motifs by ESTingatinga entered the art trade.

technology

Edward Saidi Tingatinga used simple materials. 3 mm hardboard from the building (4 ft × 8 ft) served as a carrier, which he cut into square panels with an edge length of 2 ft ("square painting"). On the smooth side he used coarse, flat brushes to paint the background from the building, mostly in one color, sometimes the upper part a little lighter than the lower. He sketched the motif with finer round brushes and filled the resulting areas with somewhat coarser round brushes. Very fine brushes for details were only rarely available (e.g. for school supplies), sometimes Q-tips were used.

Tingatinga initially used bicycle paint, which was readily available, and later oil-based paint, also available in 1/2-liter cans in many colors at the hardware store and can be diluted and washed off with paint thinner, petroleum or even kerosene. The paint dries slowly, which is why a long drying time is always necessary between the work steps. In the end, the picture has the characteristic shine and luminosity.

Finally, the picture was nailed to a narrow wooden frame from the back. The frame was painted in color, the inside facing the picture in a different color than the outside and front, which creates a light three-dimensional effect.

It was not until 1989, on Charinda's initiative, that the hardboard was replaced by fabric stretched on a simple wooden frame, which made new formats possible. In addition, the pictures could now be taken out of the frame and rolled for easy transport. As the customers were (and are) mainly tourists and expatriates, this was very convenient. The early fabrics, however, were often very thin, so that the thick layers of paint sometimes broke, especially in the European cold. For several years now, the cooperative has been buying a more stable canvas for all painters on the market, as well as the paints and brushes. However, really good brushes are still a popular souvenir from Europe.

Since the wooden frame that was previously also nailed on was no longer available, the artists initially replaced it for many years with a painted black frame, often supplemented by a thinner inner white one - a feature of the Tingatinga pictures until around 2010. Since then, this frame has been disappearing more and more.

Tingatinga painters do not use easels. You support the upper end of the picture on a small desk, the lower one on your thighs.

Current situation

The current discussion about Tingatinga art or Tingatinga handicrafts concerns various aspects. There are already considerable differences of opinion about the name of this art direction. Temporary efforts by the management of the cooperative to establish the name "Tinga Tinga" have been abandoned. The name "Tinga Tinga" has actually never played a serious role in the international art scene. The only correct name is the term Tingatinga (art, painting and so on), which is a tribute to the founder of this East African art movement, Eduardo Saidi Tingatinga.

Again and again there are discussions about whether Tingatinga paintings are to be regarded as art or handicraft or simply as "Airport Art", mass-produced for tourists. Tine Thorup examines this question in the introduction to the exhibition catalog "Kitsch or Quality".

Tingatinga, Traditional Wall Paintings and Rock Art

Whether there is a relationship between Tingatinga, traditional wall paintings and rock art cannot be scientifically proven and remains an open question. Some researchers have asked whether Tingatinga art has its roots in the traditional murals seen on the huts around the place where Edward Saidi Tingatinga was born. Many wall paintings were personally witnessed on site by Daniel Augusta in the village of Ngapa in 2009, where the family of Edward Saidi Tingatinga's father still lives (see photo). The same findings were made by other explorers: Karl Heule wrote about the first known and documented encounter with the wall paintings in 1906 in southern Tanzania in his book “Negerleben in Deutsch-Ost Afrika”, Leipzig, 1908. Further photo documentation of the wall paintings came from Ethnologist and photographer Jesper Kirknaes. And there is another researcher who traveled as far as southern Tanzania and visited the villages of ES Tingatinga there: it was Kenji Shiraishi, an art curator from Japan. Although the rich tradition of Makua murals is known, Tingatinga art is presented to the public as an artistic form without any historical roots. Berit Sahlstöm's article “Tingatinga and his followers”, for example, seeks the elucidation of the Tingatinga style in comparative connection with modern Mozambican art (Malangatana, Idasse, Jose Craverinha and John Muafangejo). Yves Goscinny looks for the roots of Tingatinga art in the encounter between ES Tingatinga and the Congolese paintings sold in Dar es Salaam (“Art in Tanzania 2010” - while looking for work opportunities, Tingatinga noticed many paintings from the Congo that were sold in stores in town and decided to try his luck). The original source is probably Merit Teisen ("In order to survive, the desperate ES Tingatinga came up with an idea to make paintings for sale"). In her article published in 1984, she also claims that ES Tingatinga decorated two walls of houses for a fee before starting painting on the small panels. But economic reasons alone cannot explain the tradition of decorating house walls within the same community in Dar es Salaam, which was documented and photographed by Jesper Kirknaes. This community consisted in the front row of the Makonde and Makua immigrants from southern Tanzania, who brought their tradition to Tanzania's business capital. In 2010 Hanne Thorup interviewed the student from ES Tingatinga - Omary Amonde. He confirmed that ES Tingatinga was already painting on hut walls as a young boy (around 12 years old). It makes more sense to claim that the roots of Tingatinga art are in the tradition of murals rather than in the economic intentions of modern Mozambican art. Therefore, it is not surprising when researchers claim that the Tinga Tinga art has its roots in the murals.

Tingatinga and George Lilanga

In the Japanese book called “Lilanga's Cosmos, Africa Hoy”, p. 7, the curator of the arts Kenji Shiraiji asked why Lilanga started to paint in the Tingatinga style. Lilanga replied: “It was only my idea to incorporate this style. Nobody suggested that I should do it. In the Tingatinga style, I use enamel paints on hard panels. Such plates are wonderful for achieving fresh colors. "

Tingatinga and Lilanga have some similarities and are related. Although Lilanga is not a Tingatinga artist, he was surrounded by the Tingatinga painters and was inspired by the Tingatinga techniques: enamel paints and square paintings. This technique was used by the Tingatinga painters as early as 1968 (Yves Goscinny, Popular Art of Tanzania), but Lilanga did not begin to paint until 1974 (Kamphausen, George Lilanga). The Italian curator Cesare Pipi writes in his book "George Lilanga - Colors of Africa": "George Lilanga moved in the artistic circles of the Tingatinga School."

It is not just the Tingatinga material and the Tingatinga techniques that George Lilanga used. He used the same bright and shiny colors as Tingatinga painters.

Lilanga borrowed colors from Tingatinga, with an extraordinary, dreamlike colored potential, which increase the already high degree of vitality in the pictures ... Without Tingatinga there would be no Lilanga, because Lilanga used the material, techniques, colors and compositions that horror Evoke emptiness, which is what Tingatinga is known for. In the book “Tingatinga, Kitsch or Quality”, the curator of art, Tine Hanne, claims: “When he [George Lilanga] met the works of art from the Tingatinga School, it had a strong influence on his artistic work. George Lilanga did not know how to supposed to paint with the Tingatinga technique, he was unable to handle the paints and brushes; he was a Makonde carver. The paintings were painted for him by Noel Kapanda and later by Mchimbi Halfani. "

George Lilanga's works of art have been exhibited together with the Tingatinga works of art on many occasions - one of the last exhibitions was in the Stadtgalerie in Ahlen . The name of the exhibition was "The hand is the tool of the soul". The exhibitions also featured artwork by Noel Kapanda, signed with George Lilanga's name, which the legend underlines under the pictures. George Lilanga traveled with Noel Kapanda, the Tingatinga painter, on several occasions to Japan and held exhibitions there. The organizer was the art curator Kenji Shiraishi. He even wrote a book, "Tingatinga and Lilanga" (The Museum of Art, Kochi, Japan, 2004). From the examples above it is perfectly clear that there are similarities between Lilanga and the Tingatinga art. These two Tanzanian artistic styles - Lilanga and Tingatinga - do not live separate lives, but interact and enrich each other to this day.

Web links

Commons : Tingatinga  - collection of images, videos and audio files

swell

  1. ^ Tingatinga Cooperative Society . 2nd Edition. Mture Educational Publishers, Dar es Salaam 2005, ISBN 9976-967-34-9 , pp. 31 f . (English, Swahili).
  2. ^ Yves Goscinny, Elias Jengo: A Concise Study on Contemporary Art in Tanzania . Ed .: Embassy of Switzerland. Dar es Salaam 2016, ISBN 978-9987-8975-9-9 , p. Chapters I and II .
  3. ^ Tingatinga bird. ( Memento from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Harrys Hamburger Hafenbasar, 2003.
  4. ↑ The Legacy of ES Tingatinga. ( Memento from September 24, 2006 in the web archive archive.today ) Helvetas .
  5. ↑ Are Tingatinga fakes a problem today? ( Memento from July 29, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  6. ^ Yves Goscinny, Elias Jengo: A Concise Study on Contemporary Art in Tanzania . Ed .: Embassy of Switzerland. Dar es Salaam 2016, ISBN 978-9987-8975-9-9 , p. 12 ff . (English).
  7. ↑ Statements by Tingatinga artists
  8. ↑ Alex Drummer: "Tinga Tinga" - The Great Error.
  9. ^ Tine Thorup, Cuong Sam: Tingatinga, Kitsch or Quality . Ed .: thorupArt. Copenhagen 2010, ISBN 978-87-992635-1-6 , pp. 8th f .
  10. ↑ Off the walls to hard board and canvas; What inspired Tingatinga? In: Hanne Thorup, Chitra Sundaram: Tingatinga, Kitsch or Art. 2010, p. 22.
  11. ^ Cesare Pipi: George Lilanga - Colors of Africa . 2007, ISBN 978-88-89298-32-9 , p. 136.
  12. ^ Catalog raisonne: George Lilanga, Enrico Masceloni. P. 12.
  13. ^ Tine Thorup: Tingatinga, Kitsch or Quality . 2010, ISBN 978-87-992635-1-6 , p. 68.
  14. ^ Karl-Ferdinand Schädler: The Tingatinga School . Panterra Verlag, Munich 1998 (German, English).