An East-German painting of African students at the VII World Festival in Vienna

In 1958, the artist Karl-Heinz Jakob (1929 – 1997) created an oil painting of two African students. While one is immersed in the book spread out on the table before him, the other peers thoughtfully over his shoulder, possibly out the window behind him. At the time the work was made, Black students were still a new theme for East German art. Even though the first eleven African students traveled from Nigeria to the GDR in 1951, there were still only about 100 students in the country at the end of the decade. They came from nations like Ghana, Cameroon, Guinea, Kenya, and Nigeria.

Jakob’s painting was first put on display from May 30 to June 30, 1959, in the Exhibition of Young Artists at the Pavilion of Art in East Berlin. The best artworks were selected by the national committee for the International Exhibition of Young Artists, which went on view from July 26 to August 4, the same year, at the VII World Festival of Youth and Students in Vienna. Jakob’s picture was reproduced in black-and-white in both catalogues and eventually printed in color on the cover of the seventh issue of the Journal Bildende Kunst. Today, it is still unclear which title Jakob originally chose for the painting. While it is called “African Students” in some publications, other articles refer to the work with a racist term.

To present the everyday life of African Students in the GDR to an international public was diplomatic strategy, designed to strengthen the relationships between the socialist country and young African states. Even though the total number of attendees at the World Festival in Vienna sank in comparison to the previous one in Moscow, the percentage of participants from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East rose. At the festival, there were celebrations of solidarity between the recently and soon-to-be decolonized countries and several seminars focused on the roles of students in these places. Jakob’s painting reflects the optimistic spirit of the new era.

This text is a guest contribution by Tobias Yale Rosen, postgraduate student at Freie Universität Berlin (December 2022).