Romuald Hazoumè

Romuald Hazoumé ( born February 7, 1962 in Porto -Novo, Benin, . Actually Romuald Hâtozoumê The former spelling is Hazoumé In March 2010, he ordered himself, that his name is now written Hazoumè. ) Is a Beninese artist, especially for is known its symbolic masks from water canisters. His works often have myths and traditions of his homeland as a motive, if there are masks, installations or large-scale paintings now.

Life and work

Romuald Hazoumè attended a French high school and enthusiastic in his youth for sport. He was judo champion of his country and also painted pictures that were influenced by all sorts of rituals and symbols of indigenous followers of certain religions of nature.

In his first public exhibition in 1989 at the Centre Culturel Français in Cotonou, he was discovered by the renowned curator of African Art Andre Magnin. He saw Hazoumés works from scrap metal, wood debris, sheet metal scraps, and old plastic cans, which he had designed to masks and so the trash, " animated ". Later exhibitions followed in various cities such as Houston, Paris, London and the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao.

At the documenta 12 in Kassel Hazoumé was represented by several works. The most spectacular was "Dream" (2007), an installation (about 200 m²) of a composite made ​​of shredded plastic canisters refugee boat, a photograph (about 30 m² ) of an African river village and a plurality of ground labels in four languages ​​( German, English, French, an African language ). The English spell was roughly translates to "Damn if they go and damned if they remain to be better, at least, and went to fail in the boat of their dreams. " This work, like many others a political statement about the current development of Africa, it was purchased by the documenta and the city of Kassel for the Neue Galerie. He was at the documenta 12 the 10,000 euro Arnold Bode Prize 2007.

Quotes

" My art can only arise here ( ..) Africa, which is the source of my inspiration. "

"It's hard to talk about an African identity. Complexity of Africa is indescribable. I think it's a testament to the arrogance of the West, if you will have us, we would have no art or the art of Yoruba folklore is. The best way to serve the people of Africa, is to give their suffering with today 's most popular object in Benin expression. But this is not the car, it is the gas cans on the streets. And these canisters are already masks. The result is a mask which can be no African mask and no likeness of an African mask. It has nothing to do with any aestheticism. "

Work

Dream, 2007