Sam Joseph Ntiro (1923-1993) has been frequently acknowledged for his historical importance in the development of modern art in East Africa (Pissarra 2015: 25). Yet he remains sorely underresearched: few have written on his pioneering role as an advocate of modern African art in the UK and United States in the 1950s-70s; or on his developmental work in East Africa, particularly during the 1960s-80s. In general, there is little cognizance of the multiple roles he played—as artist, author, art educator, arts administrator, diplomat, and civil servant.
Perceptions of Ntiro's art, too, have played a role in marginalizing him within African art history.1 Some have cast Ntiro into the role of the “good native” colluding in Western fabrications of an authentic Africa (Sanyal 2000, 2013; Jengo 2021). Conversely, a growing body of scholarship foregrounds the pan-African and socialist content of his work (Kakande...