In this publication, Pélagie Gbaguidi’s presents new paintings as well as works with textiles and drawings.

The artist calls herself a contemporary ‘griot’, which she defines as someone who functions as an intermediary between individual memory and ancestral past.

Her work is an anthology of the signs and traces of trauma and is centred on colonial and postcolonial history.

She aims to reveal the process of forgetting by recontextualizing archives and histories.

The images that Gbaguidi creates – through painting, drawing, performance and installation – seek to escape from binary thinking, archetypes and simplifications.

Published on occasion of the exhibition ‘Le jour se lève’, 12 March – 29 May 2022, Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp.

Co-published with Zeno X.