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Martin Dixon Nicolas Sarkozy Dakar Address Abdoulaye Wade 2007 Senegal - $475 (Upper West Side)
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Abdoulaye Wade and Nicolas Sarkozy, Election Rally Motorcade, 2007, printed 2008
Description: Wade and Sarkozy travel through the crowd presenting themselves in a semi-convertible limousine and motorcade with visible security detail.
Historical significance: Sarkozy presence in Dakar, Senegal, was part of a tour of Africa that he intended to use to signal a new relationship between France and Africa. However, this aim was undercut by his candid and seemingly incongruent messages in what has become known as his Dakar address or speech, which was held at Cheikh Anta Diop Univerity. (The speech was also intended to acknowledge a migration management agreement between the two countries.) While recognizing Africa's fraught history and slavery as a crime against humanity, Sarkozy also pointed to African's internal conflicts and stated that "the tragedy of Africa is that the African has not fully entered into history . . . They have never really launched themselves into the future." Sarkozy's intention to implore responsibility and self-accountability on Africa for its circumstance was a candid departure from past diplomacy. The address's message---and Sarkozy's delivery---was perceived by many as condescending, ahistorical, and out of touch with contemporary Africa and its aspirations. Further, its placement of the responsibility for Africa's conditions on African's failure to act by one of its historic colonizers was unwelcome. The Dakar address garnered notoriety, wide spread criticism, and controversy.
Dakar Noir Series
Sacre Coeur, Dakar, Senegal
Dimension: Image: 20 x 29 in.; Frame: 27 x 37 in.
Color print
Printed and framed by Laumont Studio, New York City
Professional dark-brown wood frame and thick mat with UV protected Plexiglas (Optimum Museum Acrylic)
Note: Installation photographs cause some works to appear darker and less defined because the right side of the wall is in partially shadow.
Provenance: Martin Dixon
Condition: Excellent.
Additional notable series and publication by Dixon: Martin Dixon, Greg Tates, “Brooklyn Kings: New York City's Black Bikers,” (New York: powerHouse Books), 2000,
Museum Collection: Dixon’s work is in the permanent collection of the Brooklyn Museum.