Jems Koko Bi is a sculptor who was born in Sifra. In 1997, he won a scholarship and left the country to live in Germany. It is probably only because of his immigration that Koko Bi is now relatively well-known on the international arts front. His sculptures often use detached body parts such as legs walking through a park or a boat full of severed heads, which is an appropriate metaphor coming from an artist who has been severed from his home country by strife.
Franck Fanny’s photographs are stunning because of their ability to portray everyday images from the Ivory Coast in a way that is realistic but without pity or judgment. He received some recognition internationally after being included in the 2013 Venice Biennale.
It is often difficult for women to penetrate the male-dominated world of art in Ivory Coast. Valeria Oka, who is one of the few female Ivorian artists to get any attention, grew up in France and not in the Ivory Coast. However, her art — which includes painting, sculpture, and performance – has a distinctly Ivorian influence in its brutality.
Abdoulaye Diarrasouba, who goes by the name Aboudia, is one of the most renowned contemporary Ivorian artists and has had exhibitions around the globe. His paintings have a childlike quality which amplifies the disturbing feelings produced by his depictions of coffins, skulls, soldiers, and other violent themes.
Paul Sika is a young Ivorian photographer whose unique style has earned him international acclaim. He uses Technicolor to make overly saturated staged photos bursting with energy and vibrancy. His imagery gives us a new way of looking at African culture.
When Nadia Beugre dances, it is powerful and thrillingly intense. The dancer-choreographer uses dance as a way to dig into themes such as Africa’s soiled past, suppression, and struggle. She often incorporates everyday objects such as plastic bottles or trash bags into her work, which takes it outside the realm of traditional dance and into performance art.
Nestor Da is a self-taught Ivorian photographer who uses elements of collage to create brutal scenes. He often juxtaposes African and Western imagery, for example using collage to make a pair of intense blue eyes peer out of an African tribal mask, or putting white legs in nice shoes on a poor African family. He lives and works in Burkina Faso.
Kouadio can be seen as a representative of young Ivorian artists in that he draws from multiple cultural influences, but merges and modernizes them in the process. His paintings and sculptures use African symbols to speak of identity and origins.
Camara Demba was born in 1970 to a family of traditional sculptors who taught him how to make the traditional masks for which Africa is known. This can be seen in Demba’s work which uses elements of traditional sculpture to create very modern pieces, such as multi-colored handcrafted robots and other figurines.
Georges Momboye is an Ivorian dancer and choreographer who currently lives and works in Paris. Momboye is the grandson of an African tribal leader who led dance ceremonies and rituals. Thus, traditional dance has long been part of Momboye’s life. In his current work, he fuses these African dance roots with European-style ballet. His works are almost always very theatrical, using props and elements such as curtains to help create a narrative. He is considered to be one of the most representative artists in modern African dance.
