Alioune Diop arrived in Paris in 1937 as a student. Ten years later, he became a French senator, Chief of Staff of the Governor General of French West Africa (FWA). He launches the magazine Présence Africaine which will reveal the greatness of African civilization. The « Black Socrates » becomes the mentor of young intellectuals, Political leaders and artists from Black Africa. In 1956, he convenes the first congress of the Black intellectuals and artists at Sorbonne, a real « Bandung of culture » and a second congress was held in 1959 in Rome. He sets up with Leopold Sédar Senghor, the concept of the first World Festival of Black Arts in Dakar in 1966.