Tingatinga gets its name from Edward Saidi Tingatinga, who was born in 1932 in a remote region of Tanzania. With just four years of primary school, Tingatinga worked on a plantation, then as domestic help for a British civil servant in Dar-es-Salaam. To supplement his family's income, he started painting colourful animals on small shingles.
Tingatinga paintings are glossy and bright. They depict elephants, lions, giraffes, hippopotami or antelope. Little space is left empty, filled instead with plant motifs, flowers or butterflies.
Tingatinga's wife started selling his paintings in Dar-es-Salaam's Morogoro quarter, and his work soon became popular with European tourists. His success attracted followers and Tingatinga began to take on students - first his relatives and then others - who learned to imitate his style.
After Tingatinga's violent death in 1972, his students organized themselves into a partnership which took on the name of the Tingatinga Arts Cooperative Society in 1990. The cooperative, which has about 50 members, is still based in the Morogoro quarter where Tingatinga's works were originally sold. In 1996, the Swiss Association for International Cooperation helped the association construct a studio near the baobab tree under which Tingatinga earlier taught his students.
The tingatinga exhibition at Szeged's Reök Palace runs from March 14 until May 7, 2008.
Author: Éva Ibos
