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.