Nakunte Diarra (born c. 1941) is a

Mali Mali (; ), officially the Republic of Mali,, , ff, 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞥆𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 𞤃𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭, Renndaandi Maali, italics=no, ar, جمهورية مالي, Jumhūriyyāt Mālī is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mal ...

an textile artist, a creator of ''

bògòlanfini Bògòlanfini or bogolan ( bm, bɔgɔlanfini; "mud cloth"; sometimes called mud-dyed cloth or mud-painted cloth in English) is a handmade Malian cotton fabric traditionally dyed with fermented mud. It has an important place in traditional Malian ...

''. A member of the Bamana tribe, Diarra learned the basics of creating ''bògòlanfini'' from her mother when she was four years old. She has been based in Kolokani for much of her career, but has traveled widely to give workshops and demonstrations of her technique, including spending two weeks at the

Smithsonian Folklife Festival The Smithsonian Folklife Festival, launched in 1967, is an international exhibition of living cultural heritage presented annually in the summer in Washington, D.C. in the United States. It is held on the National Mall for two weeks around the F ...

in 2003. In 1993 30 of her works were exhibited in an exhibition organized by the

Indiana University Art Museum The Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University opened in 1941 under the direction of Henry Radford Hope.Baden, Linda J. Indiana University Art Museum: Dedication. Bloomington, IN: Museum, 1982. Print. The museum was intended to be the center of ...

that also traveled to the

Fashion Institute of Technology The Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) is a public college in New York City. It is part of the State University of New York (SUNY) and focuses on art, business, design, mass communication, and technology connected to the fashion industry. ...

. Her art was the subject of an article, "Nakunte Diarra: Bogolanfini Artist of the Bélédougou", published in the journal '' African Arts'' in 1994, and of a

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

produced in 2005. Two pieces by Diarra were commissioned for the collection of the Indiana University Art Museum, while other cloths are owned by the

National Museum of African Art The National Museum of African Art is the Smithsonian Institution's African art museum, located on the National Mall of the United States capital. Its collections include 9,000 works of traditional and contemporary African art from both Sub-S ...

, the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...

, and the

National Museum of Mali The National Museum of Malí (french: Musée national du Mali) is an archaeological and anthropological museum located in Bamako, the capital of Mali. It presents permanent and temporary exhibits on the history of Mali, as well as the musical inst ...

. Diarra's work was represented in the exhibition, "Earth Matters," at the National Museum of African Art in 2014. Diarra was the subject of ''My Baby'', a children's book by Jeanette Winter, featuring a fictional account of the Malian artist as she created mudcloth during her pregnancy for her own child.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Diarra, Nakunte 1940s births Year of birth uncertain Living people Textile artists Malian women artists Women textile artists 20th-century women textile artists 21st-century women textile artists Bamana people People from Koulikoro Region 20th-century textile artists 21st-century textile artists 21st-century Malian people