Recordings from Ogooue-Congo, 1946

Recordings from Ogooue-Congo
14x11 inches, spray paint and pencils on paper, 2020

Searching for an image to represent the Whistle Band of the Wara people for the Top 100, or any information concerning the Wara was difficult. The only reference, and only image of the Wara tribe I was able to detect came from a Christian site, The Joshua Project, monitoring missionary work and the spread of Christianity throughout the world. Quote: "...the Wara have a dubious distinction: they are generally regarded as the last of Burkino Faso's people to wear clothing..." I assume they meant "don't wear clothing" but hey, authors make mistakes too. The Wara, all 9,600 of them according to The Joshua Project, are resisting change. The liner notes, written by Gilbert Rouget and edited by Alan Lomax, on the album African Music from the French Colonies, number 2 in the Colombia World Library of Folk and Primitive Music series, also note that the Wara are an "island of ancient culture around which the mainstream of migration has flowed." The recording of the whistle band was made Andre Rouget in the Banfora district of Upper Volta (as Burkino Faso was then called as part of French Equatorial Africas) in 1948. In 1946 both Didier and Rouget were part of the Ogooue-Congo Mission famous for its distinction as being the first to record pygmy music. For a source image I settled for a photo, presumably taken by Rouget, of Didier recording during the Ogooue-Congo mission. The musician, too tall to be one of the Banbenga people Rouget and Didier recorded, holds something in his mouth (a flute, or whistle?) When I painted Didier last year I edited the musician away, so here is the other half without Didier this time.