Booth D1, Hall 2.0
June 13–16, 2024
After a first participation at Art Basel “Statements” in June 2022, OH Gallery is pleased to present this year Viyé Diba in “Feature” sector.
In the heart of the Plateau, the historic city center of Dakar (Senegal), stands OH Gallery, a unique venue for contemporary art and creation. The gallery hosts monographic and group exhibitions as well as an off-site program that engages with the public. OH contributes to fostering an audacious rhythm to contemporary creation in Senegal. Its ambition is to forge strong connections with the cultural actors surrounding it by sharing projects and establishing collaborations, whether local or international, working towards the collective construction of a critical discourse. The exhibited artists transform their singularity into a dialogue, making their hybrid origins resonate across borders. For two years, the gallery has been starting a historical searching work, representing modern senegalese artists.
In this way, the gallery presents a project dedicated to the Senegalese artist Viyé Diba, marking his debut appearance at an art fair. Diba is a master artist, a researcher unafraid to challenge contemporary practices and advocate for greater artistic conceptualization. For nearly 50 years, Diba pursued a career far removed from the art market, dedicating himself entirely to his research and small-scale production. Winner of the Grand Prix Léopold Sédar Senghor at the Dakar Biennial in 1998, his work has been featured in numerous exhibitions worldwide and is part of many institutional collections such as the Smithsonian Museum, Peabody Essex Museum, UCLA Fowler Museum, World Bank, Fondation Aterrana Stiffung, Fondation Hans Bogadske, Fondation Blachère, Fondation Peter Gabriel, Newark Museum, and more recently the Centre Pompidou.
Viyé Diba was born in 1954 in Karantaba, Senegal. He is a graduate of the Institut National des Arts and École Normale Supérieure d’Éducation Artistique in Dakar in addition to the École Pilote Internationale d’Art et de Recherche de la Villa Arson in Nice. He then completed a postgraduate degree in geography at the University of Nice on the theme of urban health and aesthetics. Diba has taught at the Institut National des Arts where he has helped train several generations of artists. Viyé Diba lives and works in Dakar. In 2022, he inaugurated a creative and research space in Dakar: Manifa.
In this curatorial proposal, OH Gallery brings together major and historical artworks from the 1990s, including Kangourou (Kangaroo), Le Langage (The Language), and Choses au mur II (Things on the wall II) and Choses au mur III (Things on the wall III), the results of several years of research, marking a significant shift in Diba’s artistic approach, also key to a turning point in modern art in Senegal. This project is accompanied by a text “With the eyes, the mind, and the hands: the mixed media work of artist Viyé Diba” written by Joanna Grabski, Foundation Professor of Art History and Dean, College of Integrative Sciences and Arts, Arizona State University, USA.
Art Basel in Basel, June 13–16, 2024. Booth D1, Hall 2.0, access to the preview. Information: Press kit / Artist CV / “Textile archives” exhibition / Presentation of OH Gallery. Contact us.
