First Steps
Contemporary Ivorian art begins with colonization. Initially stemming from Western, and more particularly French, academism, it became emancipated in the early 1950s thanks to the pan-African awareness driven by the Negritude movement. Among the pioneers of modern Ivorian art is the sculptor Christian Lattier, whose rope compositions are chronicled by challenging the conventions of traditional sculpture. Forsaking the usual noble materials in favour of wire and strings, he broke away from the heritage of his ancestors and that of the whites, in a practice he calls "sculptural experience". Nicknamed the "Tutelary Tree", the painter Michel Kodjo is the first Ivorian artist to exhibit alone at the Abidjan City Hall, three years before the country's independence. His works, which embody the fusion of traditional and contemporary art, will be exhibited in Paris, New York and Frankfurt.
Breath of independence
Shortly after independence, the young Côte d'Ivoire hastened to build up a strong national culture to take its place on the international stage. Emphasis is placed on training. The foundation of the National Higher School of Fine Arts in Abidjan is entrusted in 1961 to the sculptor Marcel Homs. Christian Lattier and the ceramist Yao Dogo are the first Ivorian artists to join the faculty. The school will welcome the future great names of Ivorian art, including the group of students at the origin of Vohou Vohou, a current based on a questioning of the aesthetic canons imported from France.
Naive painters
The future Regional Conservatory of Arts and Crafts of Abengourou is at the origin of an important current of Ivorian contemporary art: the naive. Their paintings, concentrated of freshness and innocence, deliver an immediately readable art that does not take itself seriously. Painting of the small things whose hyper-democratic extension finds its inspiration even in the street, it has the advantage of speaking to everyone, which explains why the naive are so popular in Côte d'Ivoire. Among its illustrious representatives are Augustin Kassi, known for his opulent Ivorian women and market scenes; Camille Kouakou, with his soft-acid colours and dizzying profusion of detail; and one of the undisputed masters of the genre, Idrissa Diarra, whose prolific work is characterised by remarkable architectural complexity and extraordinary purity of line and colour.
Vohou-Vohou
This decisive current of Ivorian art was born in 1985 with the manifesto exhibition organized at the French Cultural Centre by young "dissident" painters. Vohou Vohou, "anything" in dialect, is presented as an art of recovery, yoke and collage on frame of heterogeneous materials highlighting the natural wealth of the Ivorian soil: tapas (beaten wood bark), cowries, rattan, sand, glue, feathers, fish bones ... By rejecting expensive material imported from France and substituting it with local raw material, the members of the Vohou Vohou intend to promote a purely African aesthetic freed from academism, thus paving the way for a creative freedom that will lead to abstract art.
Lone Riders
There are some beautiful individual courses, such as those of Jacques Samir Stenka and Ouattara Watts. Originally from Bingerville, Stenka considers himself an abstract mystic and has to his credit more than 25,000 paintings, some of which have joined the Quai Branly museum collection. He was the first African painter to enter the Beaux-Arts de Paris, where he depicted the stylized characters of a personal cosmogony in which women and Egyptian ancestors figure prominently. His pictorial language is said to be the fruit of a journey to the afterlife through the great lost civilizations, indelibly marked by the black man. A messenger of messages from the "Other World", his language has been described as "mediationism". For his part, Ouattara Watts is the most American of Ivorian artists. Initiated by his healing grandfather to the mysteries of nature and the cosmos, the painter is a legend because he helped open the doors of galleries to black artists, but also for his friendship with Jean-Michel Basquiat, who convinced him to try his luck in New York. His canvases-sculptures, imposing and rhythmic, question his relationship to the world in an interlacing of cryptic symbols, materials and objects found, adorned with dark or luminous colours. Without denying his African heritage, the artist-plastician enriches it with the "elsewhere" and the "others" that inspire him.
A key figure in contemporary art and a bearer of the wisdom of the continent, Frédéric Bruly-Bouabré (1921-2014) escapes all classification and is a national heritage monument in all categories. Along with Ouattara Watts, he has been one of the most highly rated Ivorian artists for more than a quarter of a century. Attentive to his impulses, this self-taught artist's art is nevertheless intellectual and philosophical. At the same time draftsman, scribe, philosopher and mystical poet, Bouabré is the brilliant inventor of a "poetry" elaborated from the natural signs inscribed in the stones of his native village. His pictographic alphabet, composed of 448 signs, was used to transcribe the great mythological tales of the Bete people. Naivety from overseas, purity fallen from the heavens, his "saying" is expressed in automatic writing in strange little children's pictures, all made in the same format, with a ballpoint pen and coloured pencils, on cardboard boxes used to wrap locks of hair imported from Asia and adorned by Abidjanese women. Some of his works are exhibited at the Museum of Civilizations of Côte d'Ivoire and La Rotonde des Arts Contemporains.Cross Trends
Many Ivorians are now improvising themselves as artists with the sole aim of producing "best-sellers" for tourists and other potential customers. One can thus find pseudo-naïf inspired by the great masters of the Abengourou school, or the approximate sub-Vohou. The real talents often meet their audience abroad and those who can go abroad. Faced with the little involvement of the State, it is the gallery owners, patrons and private structures that take over. The creative energy is materialized by the emergence of talents such as Aboudia - often compared to Basquiat -, known for its monumental paintings on the battle of Abidjan, and whose colourful, wild and childlike "nouchi paintings" have joined the picture rails of the prestigious Saatchi gallery as well as Jean Pigozzi's private collection of contemporary African art. We also remember the sculptor Demba Camara and his "art toys", fetishes revisited with manga sauce; the painter Pascal Konan, extraordinary interpreter of the African city and its emotions, and the artist Yéanzi, author of incredible "recycled portraits". As far as photography is concerned, Abidjan has seen the development of a dynamic and eclectic scene over the last decade. If the elders (Ananias Leki Dago, Macline Hien, Franck Abd-Bakar Fanny, François-Xavier Gbré, Seybou Traoré, Dorris Haron Kasco...) have proved their worth, they confirm a talent that improves with time. Young photographers such as Joana Choumali, Paul Sika and Phillis Lissa (Ly LaGazelle) are the next generation of photographers.
Private Network
Galleries and exhibition halls are multiplying in Abidjan to accommodate the emerging art scene. Among the key promoters of the fine arts are Simone Guirandou (LouiSimone Gallery), Yacouba Konaté (La Rotonde des arts), Illa Donwahi (Charles Donwahi Foundation), Thierry Dia (Houkami Guyzagn Gallery), Jacob Bleu (LeBasquiat Art Gallery), Werewere Liking (Village Ki-Yi),Marie-Josée Hourantier (Bin Ka Di So), Cécile Fakhoury (Cécile Fakhoury Gallery), Monique Kaïdin Le Houelleur (Villa Kaïdin). Less well known to the general public, passionate young people act on their own scale to make things happen and bring promising talent to light. For example, the association A'Lean & Friends, which organises Cité des Arts, an event launched in 2016 through which the public was able to discover Halidou (painting), Essoh Sess (painting, poetry, street art) and Ly LaGazelle (photography), or Isabelle Zongo, who gave us invaluable help in the development of these pages, and launched the first digital platform for the promotion of arts and culture with a focus on Africa at the end of 2017, the ORIGINVL Foundation (www.originalfound.com).Public Messenger
The taste for creation that characterizes Ivorians has naturally led them to express themselves in the public space. At first badly perceived, street art is loved as an added value to the territory. Afterwards, its role in educating and informing the population, in the form of graffiti in playlets, paved the way for its recognition. Over the past twenty years or so, street art has literally become part of the mainstream, even becoming institutionalized, as in Abobo. The pupils of this commune are at the origin of the gbôchôli, a sort of signature made up of names and numbers visible in the local Plaque district. The craze for street art explodes on the walls of Abidjan. Among the giant frescoes, spot the dignified and distinguished women painted by the artist YZ. Of Franco-British origin, she combines art and politics in her project Street Vendors, which depicts female street vendors in different parts of the city. Also worth seeing are the works executed by young graffiti artists invited to express themselves on the walls of the former Partners Village in Treichville. Dozens of works deal with various themes through this precursory project in Abidjan.
