Pélagie Gbaguidi

• Born — 1965 • Birthplace — Dakar, Senegal • Education — l'École des beaux-arts Saint-Luc • Known for — Multi-media • Notable Works — Le Code Noir; The Missing Link. Dicolonisation Education by Mrs Smiling Stone; Care

Gbaguidi was born in Dakar in 1965. She studied art in Liège, Belgium, at l'École des beaux-arts Saint-Luc, and graduated in 1995.

The artist calls herself a contemporary "griot” — traditionally meaning a vessel for West African oral tradition, it is an intermediary between the physical realm and that of the ancestors who uses art and music as their means of translation. A griot questions the individual experience by absorbing the words of the ancients and modeling them into art to be interpreted by their living descendants. Her art is an anthology of the signs and traces of trauma, and is centered on archiving colonial and postcolonial African history. With her work, she aims to unmask the process of forgetting the most violent hardships of the past. In venturing to unveil these suppressed memories, the abstract ideas she addresses seem to arouse in the artist an urgency to give them form, this need to create liberating images becoming a corpus from which to draw contemporary forms. Inspired by her residency at the Centre des Arts Contemporains in Nantes, Gbaguidi created a large series of drawings and paintings in 2004 titled Le Code Noir, which references the French code for slavery conduct that was conceived by Louis XIV's court and in use from 1685–1848. The project seeks to confront the violence enacted by these slavery regulations, and 100 drawings from the series were purchased by the Mémorial ACTe centre in Guadeloupe. In 2017, she created The Missing Link. Dicolonisation Education by Mrs Smiling Stone, a large-scale installation commissioned for Documenta 14. The multi-media work focuses on how the history of subjects like slavery, Nazism, and Apartheid are taught, and features objects such as school desks and tables, drawings on transparent paper, photographs, music recordings, and videos. In 2019-2020, she created Care, a fabric-based work that resembles a tent and consists of a colorful embroidered plastic flour sack, tarpaulin, and wooden beams. The work addresses the act of exchange—which is referenced through both the inclusion of common trades materials like burlap sacks and the use of an embroidery technique that she learned from local women in Essaouira, Morocco, during an artist residency there.

• 2021 - "Congoville", MIDDELHEIM MUSEUM, Antwerp (Belgium) May 2021; CENTRALE for contemporary art, Brussels (Belgium) March, 2021 • 2020 - "Somewhere in the World", FORUM FROHNER, Krems (Austria); "B:11 Berlin Biennale. The Crack Begins Within", Berlin (Germany) 05/09/2020-01/11/2020. • 2019 - "Décoloniser les corps" in the context of the Festival Désir...Désirs, curated by Pascal Lièvre. Tours (France); "Somewhere in the World", FORUM FROHNER, Krems (Austria); “Généalogies futures depuis l’équateur”, Lubumbashi Biennale, Lubumbashi (Democratic Republic of the Congo). • 2018 - "Décoloniser les corps", 2e Biennale art nOmad 2018, Limoges / Bourges / Paris / Calais / Brussels / Berlin. Curated by Pascal Lièvre; "Un-masking in the Plural", Dak'ART 13 The Red Hour A New Humanity, Dakar (Senegal); Art Brussels 50 years, Art Fair, Brussels (Belgium); "i am what i am", ici Gallery, curated by Julie Crenn, Paris (France); "Disclosed Traces and Triadic Apparitions", Sulger-Buel Lovell, curated by Mika Hayashi Ebbesen, London (UK). • 2017 - "The Missing Link. Dicolonisation Education by Mrs Smiling Stone", documenta 14 Learning from Athens, Athens (Greece); "El iris de Lucy”, CAAM, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Spain); “HERstory” – Des Archives Féministes (Feminist Archives), Maison des Arts de Malakoff, Paris (France); "Afriques Capitales", La Gare Saint Sauveur, Lille (France); XXIII. Rohkunstbau: Die Schönheit im Anderen | The Beauty of Difference “Naked Writing” Palace of Lieberose (Germany); AKAA 2017 edition, Paris (France) • 2016 - “El iris de Lucy”, Musac, Castilla y León (Spain); “L’iris de Lucy”, Musée Rouchechouart, (France); “Dakar-Matigny”, Manoir de la ville, Martigny Suisse; “1:54” Contemporary African Art Fair”, London (United Kingdom); “El Mundo sans le corps”, Solo show Gallery Sulger-Buel-Lovell, London (United Kingdom). • 2015 - Acquisition of 100 drawings from series Code Noir, Acte Memorial Museum, Guadeloupe (France); “Divine Comedy: Heaven, Hell, Purgatory Revisited by Contemporary African Artists”, National Museum of African Art - Smithsonian Institution, Washington (USA). • 2014 - “Divine Comedy: Heaven, Hell, Purgatory Revisited by Contemporary African Artists”, MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt (Germany); “Legitimate Abstractions”, Moroccan Pavilion Dak’Art Biennale de Dakar, Dakar (Senegal). • 2013 - “Asyl Stadtmuseum”, Stadtmuseum, Munich (Germany); “Traces of Women”, Villa des Arts Casablanca (Morocco); “Serial Attempts” News of the World Gallery, London (United Kingdom). • 2012 - 1st Casablanca Biennale (Marroco); “Africa Africa”, Centre of Contemporary Art (CAC) Meymac, (France). • 2011 - “Around the Black Code”, National Orchestra Belgium with B.Giaux A.Lavoisier S.Causanchi, BOZAR, Brussels (Belgium); “As it is, Ancestral Space”, Gallery Mojo, Dubai (United Arab Emirates). • 2010 - “Show off”, Girot Gallery, fiac off Paris, Paris (France); “Code Noir”, Apex pro e.V Gallery, (solo show) Göttingen (Germany). • 2009 – "Africaines" 2nd Festival Panafricain, Safex, Alger; “Spot on…”, Ifa Gallery in Berlin and Ifa Gallery Stuttgart (Germany); "Legacy of Absence Collection." ILLINOIS HOLOCAUST MUSEUM AND EDUCATION CENTER, Chicago (United States) • 2008 - IFAA Museum of Modern Art, Arnhem (Nerthelands); IFAA Afrika Museum Arnhem (Nerthelands); “Écouter et entendre”, Kevin Conru Gallery, Brussels (Belgium); “#2008 DAK’ART Afrique: Mirror?”, Dak’Art Biennale of Dakar (Senegal); “Code Noir” Musical Exhibition, Royal Music Conservatory, Brussels (Belgium); Maison des Arts, Evreux (France). • 2007 - "Africa plural 3+3", Casa Africa, las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Spain); "Le code Noir", Factory, Krems, Autriche; Black Fine Art Show, Atlanta (USA); "Dockanema", festival du film Mozambique, Maputo, (Mozambique). • 2006 - National Black Fine Art Show, New York (USA); 2006 Dak’Art Biennale of Contemporary African Art (Senegal); “L’homme est un mystère”, Musée d’art et d’histoire, Saint-Brieuc (France); Museum of Modern Art, Santo Domingo, (Dominican Republic). • 2005 - National Black Fine Art Show, New York (USA); “Démarcations”, Centre Wallonie Bruxelles, Paris (France). • 2004 - 2004 Dak’Art Biennale of Contemporary African Art, Dakar (Senegal); “A3” Contemporary Art Night, Saint-Sulpice, Paris; “Nouvelles Impressions: Beauté Afrique”, Le Lieu Unique, Nantes (France); “Sacred Rites/ Profane Rites”, AFAA (French Association of Artistic Action), Bern (Switzerland); “Sacred Rites/ Profane Rites”, AFAA (French Association of Artistic Action), Mexico. • 2003- “Rites sacrés/ Rites profanes” Ves Rencontres Africaines de la Photographie. Bamako 2003 (Mali); Solo show, Les Alizés Gallery, Brussels (Belgium); “Rhizome”, Espace d'Art Contemporain, Torcy, (France). • 2001 - OFF - IV Rencontres de la photographie africaine, Bamako (Mali); Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Liege (Belgium).

• 2018 - Civitella Ranieri Foundation Fellowship • 2016 – NIROX Foundation, South Africa • 2013 - Villa Waldberta Munich • 2012 - IFITRY Morocco • 2011 - Thamgidi FoundaXon, Netherlands • 2007 - Factory, Krems, Austria • 2004 - Lieu Unique, Nantes, France

• El Mundo Sans le Corps • The Missing Word • Divine Comedy

• L'Artothèque, île de la Réunion • Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, Chicago IL, USA • Casa África, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain • Memorial ACTe, Pointe-à-Pitre, Guadeloupe Islands • Mu.ZEE, Ostende, Belgium • Kanal - Centre Pompidou, Brussels, Belgium • Private Collection, Zurich, Switzerland