-Artist-
Siddig El Nigoumi
According to Jane Perryman, author of the book, Smoke Firing: Contemporary Artists and Approaches, El Nigoumi was the most successful of his generation of ex-patriot African Artists at synthesizing African, Arab and British cultural influences. Born in Sudan in 1931, he was a calligrapher at first, who abstracted the art to embellish his clay canvasses in the form of dishes, pots and animal figurines. El Nigoumi claims he enjoyed playing with mud on the banks of the Nile River, which gave him the interest in pottery. He trained at Khartoum Art School (1952 – 1955) and became a calligrapher then shortly after, studied in London at the Central School of Art.
Then he returned to Sudan to teach. It is believed that as a teacher, El Nigoumi encouraged his students to look towards their own culture and traditions, often bringing his classes to analyze shapes at the Ethnographical Museum. In 1967, he moved to England where he continued to teach and decided to settle permanently, finding it to be a more creative environment. In 1987, he was featured in the Aberystwyth Ceramics festival. For El Nigoumi, being an Artist, African and Sudanese were extremely important. He found expression for his identity in his ceramics.