Omar Mahfoudi

France

Paris

AFIKARIS Gallery

Drawing

Sans titre

Sans Titre

Painting

Flowers grow out from dark moments

L'homme bleu

Moonlight

Quitter la ville

The Moon and Never Back 1

The Moon and Never Back 2

Flower Boy 2

Baigneur égaré

Le fantôme de détroit

Ghost of the Lake

Baigneur 2

Baigneur 1

Landscape

Blue storm / Orage bleu

Le naufragé

Flowers grow out of dark moments 2

In the context of the current international health crisis, leaving the city appears to be an escape route. If a time existed where cities embodied endless possibilities, they could reveal to be suffocating, objects of boredom, isolation and even danger. The health, ecological and economic situation also stirs this temptation of an urban exodus. 

However, the city and its torments inspired generations of artists. Some of them - from the impressionists Monet and Caillebotte, to the street artists who thrive in city centers. Photographers such as Andreas Gursky or Michael Tsegaye and Andrew Esiebo document and play with the mutations of urban space, its harmony as well as its chaos. Others, like Houston Maludi, are mesmerised by its meanders and fascinated by the rhythm of its architecture. If the city feeds the imagination, it is also a source of alienation. Cameroonian painter Jean David Nkot illustrates this relation of domination between the territory and the body in ”The Shadows of Space” series. Here, the city erases the faces of those who dreamed of it. 

The exhibition “Quitter la Ville” deviates from the bustle of the city, offering a complete immersion into the welcoming and lush nature depicted by artists Moustapha Baidi Oumarou and Omar Mahfoudi. In both of their work, nature embodies an ideal. If one reinterprets the world and the other captures the “mystical beauty” with his brushes, both of them explore this “flower boy”: sensitive being, a symbol of humanity and joy, who conveys hope and optimism.

Quitter la Ville

Quitter la Ville

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