Mali, an impoverished West African nation, is nevertheless wealthy in artistic, historical, and musical dimensions. Since its independence in 1960, Mali's government has very actively used the arts towards the creation of a national identity; however, contemporary visual art, introduced with the founding of a national art academy in 1963, struggles to be integrated into Malian culture. Artists working in Mali are affected by several factors: a small and insular, but lively artistic circuit, economic factors severely limiting the availability of materials and education, and, pervading all aspects of art-making, an almost entirely foreign and government-based system of patronage.
Within this milieu, I discuss the dichotomous models of African art which pit traditional against modern, indigenous against foreign, and conclude that these categories are not discrete, but that all artists move back and forth among these poles, borrowing as it suits their purposes. I propose the term "indigenist modernism" to capture in a broad stroke many artists' practice of couching concepts and images from traditional culture in western art media. The revival of bogolanfini, Mali's traditional mud-dyed textile, serves as an example of altering traditional forms to meet modern-day criteria of fine art or tourist commodity. I describe the proscriptive conditions Malian artists face, and the ramifications of outside patronage and those patrons preconceptions on the artists' content. I mention prominent Malian artists and their diverse artistic strategies, and I include three case studies based on studio visits and interviews with four artists in Bamako. I conclude that while patrons of Malian art may take away simple souvenirs of Africa, the artists are working with great determination to contribute to Malian patrimony and to global culture.