Write notes on Momodou Ceesay under the following headings:
(a) training;
(b) style;
(c) general contributions to the development of arts.
Majority of the candidates avoided this question and most of the few that attempted it wrote on the artist as a Nigeria instead of a Gambian and this made them to score low marks. The following were some of the points expected from the candidates:
- Training
- he received his early education in Banjul.
- he studied with scholarship at Suffiew Academy and Wesleyan University in Connecticut, USA.
- he received a Bachelor of Arts (BA) Degree in Languages and Literature in 1970.
- after his university education, he chose to pursue a career in art and thus became an essentially self taught artist.
- he received diplomas in French language from the University de Poitiers in Tours and La Sorbonne in Paris.
` (b) Style
- his compositions are decorative.
- he used stylized figures, masks, costumes and foliage at the background.
- motifs from baobab tree are obvious in his works.
- his female portraits are often romanticized and rendered realistically.
- most of his figures are gracefully elongated.
- he incorporates the brilliant details of the colourful West African fabric
designs into the costumes of his figures.
(c) General contributions to the development of art
- he is a pioneer Gambian contemporary artist.
- he taught art at the Elmer Lewis School of Art in Boston, Massachusetts in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
- he has been a great ambassador of contemporary African art.
- he has exhibited in different countries around the world, e.g. Nigeria,
Colombia, Massachusetts, Taiwan, Slovakia, Pennsylvania, etc.
- he has his works in different public and private collections around the world, such as National Library, The Gambia, President’s Office, Banjul, Museum of African Art, Los Angeles, California, USA among numerous others.
