To celebrate its new space located at 7 rue Notre-Dame-de-Nazareth, AFIKARIS Gallery gathers through the exhibition Classique ! thirteen artworks inspired by
masterpieces from art history. Whether they are key artworks or lesser known works, they all paved the way for the artists who succeeded them, as they keep marking their visual writing. Inherited from the long tradition of appropriation, they embody the personal reinterpretation of paintings, photographs - and
even sometimes artistic movements - by their author. The show also mark the collaboration between the gallery and two artists: Richard Mensah et Daniel Pengrapher. 

July 1st, 2022 (Paris, France) – Whilst it settled down in December 2020 at 38 rue Quincampoix in the 4th arrondissement, AFIKARIS Gallery takes over a new space located at 7 rue Notre-Dame-de-Nazareth in the 3rd. For its first exhibition, the gallery features thirteen exclusive works by eleven different artists of the gallery - Moustapha Baidi Oumarou, Matthew Eguavoen, Salifou Lindou, Richard Mensah, Omar Mahfoudi, Ousmane Niang, Jean David Nkot, Hyacinthe Ouattara, Nana Yaw Oduro, Daniel Pengrapher and Marc Posso.
In parallel, the solo show Les pommes de la discorde devoted to the Cameroonian artist Jean David Nkot will keep running until September 13th at 38 rue Quincampoix.

The exhibition Classique ! asks: “How does what we see influence our imagination?” And testifies the way artworks designed in the past never die
and keep living through contemporary creation. These images penetrate our unconscious and become part of our visual culture. Shapes, colours and atmosphere are many factors which taint the art from any time and of any type -
including visual arts, cinema and performance. The influences intertwine and compose a new language. The mix of cultural and visual elements taking place is in the continuity of the artworks they draw inspiration from - sometimes
themselves the result of the adoption of a myth or an older work: from the antique maenads to Christian iconography. 

With La vie de Pablo, Daniel Pengrapher (b.1998, Nigeria) reminds Picasso’s art richness and diversity by gathering within one same canvas two of the periods that built his fame: the blue period - through La Vie (1903) - and the cubism
- Les demoiselles d’Avignon (1907). The young Nigerian painter rebuilds the tormented spirit of Picasso through the events that shaped his life as his painting. He also disseminates some contemporary elements to create a bridge
between past and present. Thus, La vie de Pablo materialises a creative cycle: from death shaking the artist’s landmarks, marking and transforming its art; until his rebirth.

In his work PO.box Plan d’aide humanitaire@yahoo.fr (2022), Jean David Nkot revisits and recontextualises La mise au tombeau (1602-1603) by baroque painter Caravaggio, itself inspired by Michelangelo’s Pieta (1498-1499). The Cameroonian painter tackles the question of raw materials exploitation by multinational companies and their impact on those who extract them. Whilst he copies the posture of the Christic figure, Nkot underlines the limits of the market economy. The body, blue, turns into matter, echoing the colour of cobalt. Analogous to the pedestal, the wooden pallet on which the silhouettes stand sacralises them and provides them with the status of icons. Thus, the artwork offers a dialogue between eras and participates in the writing of contemporary history.

Sometimes imbued with the scene and with energy being displaced, sometimes by the artistic approach: Moustapha Baidi Oumarou, Matthew Eguavoen, Salifou Lindou, Omar Mahfoudi, Richard Mensah, Ousmane Niang, Jean David Nkot, Nana Yaw Oduro, Hyacinthe Ouattara, Daniel Pengrapher and Marc Posso reinterpret works that participated in building the history of art and echo their own practice. The artists felt free to change the original medium or the size. They took possession of the work to make it theirs.

Classique !

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