NPR

This rising painter reimagines Renaissance art in a cocoa plantation in Cameroon

Cameroonian painter Marc Padeu says that being an African artist means "being the heir to an extraordinarily rich history." But he also says it can mean "living and working on a continent where artistic infrastructure is virtually nonexistent."

 

Padeu's work often takes inspiration from religious paintings from the European Renaissance — but reimagines them, depicting people in Cameroon's cocoa plantations. London gallery Larkin Durey is currently holding an exhibition of Padeu's latest work.

 

Oliver Durey, the gallery's director, said: "Mark's work is timeless. His visual style is simultaneously very contemporary but also deeply rooted in that old tradition — so there is something extremely fresh about it."

 

Except from Robbie Griffith's interview with Marc Padeu for NPR. See the full article here:  Marc Padeu NPR interview

August 14, 2026