Photo de Famille, 2014, forms part of a series of paintings most of which were made during Ba’s 2014 visit to Dakar. Although soaked with a spirit of crises, Ba’s paintings leave the viewer with a feeling of elation as the images of warfare and symbols of political power are diffused among elaborate patterns and vibrant colours, often inspired by traditional Senegalese ornaments. Ba’s goal, however, is to create works that would speak a visual language not tied to a particular tradition or culture. Therefore the “urgence”, in Ba’s paintings, is a universal characteristic of the postmodern condition; the themes explored - those of politics, culture, history, etc. – point to a general state of affairs rather than to any local issue in particular, reflecting the artist’s interest in society as a whole. As Alain Quemin writes, ‘[t]here is a kind of magic in the way Ba’s work talks with such aptness and wisdom about the gravest events […] by the grace of painting, he manages simultaneously to neither soften the impact of its implacable message nor renounce the beauty of form’ (‘Omar Ba, fantastical moralist’ in Omar Ba: The Prophecy of the People of Durban, Galerie Guy Bärtschi, Hales Gallery, Galerie Anne De Villepoix and Galleria Giuseppe Pero, 2014).