Félix Ossali
Biography

Félix Ossali (also recorded as Ossiali) holds a founding place in the history of the École de Peinture de Poto-Poto in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo. According to the story told and retold about the school's origins, the French artist Pierre Lods came home one day to find his servant Ossali painting birds on paper in a manner unlike anything he had been taught; rather than correct him, Lods invited Ossali and a handful of others to paint informally under his roof — a gathering that by 1951 had grown into the Poto-Poto studio.

Ossali is credited with originating what became known as the “Miké” style: small figures with schematic, elongated forms recalling the rock paintings of Tassili n'Ajjer, which shaped the school's output through the early 1950s before later generations diversified its range. His own paintings and drawings, worked in gouache and ink, favour dense, decorative botanical and animal subjects.

As with his fellow Poto-Poto painters, his work is signed with the initials “PPP” (Peintres de Poto-Poto).

source: École de peinture de Poto-Poto (Wikipédia); African Contemporary essay on the Poto-Poto School