Pélagie Gbaguidi (born 1965) is originally from Senegal to 1995 and studied painting at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Liege, Belgium. She has lived for over thirty years in Europe, including long periods in Paris and Marseille. Meanwhile, lives and works near Brussels.
Gbaguidi sees himself as a West African "griot". A person who passes the knowledge of a culture and thus preserves the history of a nation Their art reflects not only the past but also the present again. Trafficking and forced prostitution are a new form of slavery is in Europe and require the individual and collective responsibility towards their own history.
Gbaguidis work has been shown in group exhibitions in many countries in Africa and in Spain, Belgium, France, Germany, Canada, the USA and Switzerland. In 2007 she showed at the Kunsthalle Krems her first solo exhibition "Le Code Noir," in which she dealt with the 60 articles making decree "Code Noir", which adopted the French King Louis XIV in 1685. The Code Noir is "a symbol of inhumanity, hypocrisy, racism, brutality and cynicism. Gbaguidi was appalled by the contents of the decree and worked in 120 drawings and a series of large canvases, the crimes of the colonial powers in the days of slavery. Your pictures bring associations with violence, suffering, oppression, torture, murder and rape, but can not substantiate this motif. Gbaguidi assumed in this case the force of "not visible".
At the 8th Biennale of Contemporary African Art 2009 in Dakar "DAK-ART" was the theme of migration ubiquitous. Gbaguidi was there with the floor installation "boomerang" to act a sea of colorful paper boats, which, as symbols of unfulfilled dreams and great despair. The ifa-Galerie in Berlin with the exhibition was "spot on DAK-Art" highlights "of the biennale in a group show at the Gbaguidi also took part.
The Senegalese artist is present in APEX both new and older works, providing an overview of their work. In APEX, the exhibition will be accompanied by a program of lectures, which are also part of Europe's relationship with African Continent deal and make the issue of migration in the focus.
