trans-fer,fondation blachère,, crédit photo Jérémie Pitot

The ancient and the contemporary reunited at the Blachère foundation

05/12/2019 - 26/09/2020
Oceane Kinhouande / 2020-07-13
2 minutes read

For this new exhibition, the Blachère Foundation presents a selection of old objects in inronwork from a private collection and contemporary works from the Blachère Collection.

Contemporary art in resonance with traditional metallurgy

The aim of this exhibition is not to reflect the full range of iron objects and sculptures from Africa, as it is the case for the exhibition “Frapper le fer” of the Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac. It’s about to compare the simple yet sophisticated shapes of objects from traditional African iron metallurgy (coins, medicine sticks, weapons, shields, etc.) with modern and contemporary African sculptures in the same metal.

View of the exhibition trans-fer, Fondation Blachère, Marius Dansou - crédit photo Jérémie Pitot
View of the exhibition trans-fer, Fondation Blachère, Marius Dansou – credit photo Jérémie Pitot

The relationship between the ancien and the modern is complemented by the recent iron sculptures by two young Beninese artists invited for a creative residency at the Blachère Foundation earlier in the year, Marius Dansou and Rémy Samuz. Drawings by Soly Cissé, photographs by J. D. Okhai Ojeikere, prints on Dibon by Mansour Ciss, but also Confluences of El Anatsui, flamboyant wall sculpture made of strips of aluminium and copper wire that refers to Ghanaian Kente textiles, and Dexu Adüna dʼAlexis Peskine, a deep portrait of a young man literally nailed to black wooden boards, constitute a discreet resonance to the iron sculptures, old and contemporary, of the exhibition

This exhibition in Apt includes the art centre of the Blachère Foundation, the painted exterior walls of the building, the garden treated as a sculpture park and the Gabriel Péri square in Apt with the Universal Prayer of Ndary Lo, already presented on the Parvis of the Popes’ Palace in Avignon in 2017.

View of the exhibition trans-fer, Fondation Blachère, Rémy Samuz - credit photo Jérémie Pitot
View of the exhibition trans-fer, Fondation Blachère, Rémy Samuz – credit photo Jérémie Pitot

Remy SAMUZ one of the exhibited artists was born in 1982 in Cotonou, Benin, where he lives and works. Since childhood, he has been creating miniature sculptures of all kinds of characters. This passion, misunderstood then, earned him to be considered as a strange child. He decided to devote himself to art only in 2003, while he was following a training in general mechanics, and develops a technique in braided wire, giving a lot of rigidity to his sculptures while maintaining a great lightness.

Trans-fer
Fondation blachère
Exhibition of contemporary art from Africa
From 5th December to 26th September 2020
zi les Bourguignons, 382 Avenue des Argiles, 84400 Apt
France

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About the author

Oceane Kinhouande

After graduating with a law degree from the University Panthéon-Assas Paris II, I joined ICART Paris to pursue an MBA in International Art Market. I am passionate about contemporary art from Africa and Afro-descendant cultures. I believe it is vital and important that contemporary art from Africa informs us about the multiplicity and nuances of its realities. It is also very important to me that this artistic expression be a vector of African and Afro-descendant history, identity and innovation.

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