PAST EXHIBITION
Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé
With Abdoulaye Konaté
7 September - 2 October 2021
On the occasion of the Parcours des Mondes and until October 2nd 2021, 31 PROJECT and Charles-Wesley Hourdé presents Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé.
This exhibition will bring together a major work by Abdoulaye Konaté, an international artist of Malian origin, with a selection of traditional Bambara sculptures from the ancient Mandé country.
By deploying his fresco, heavily laden with the symbols of caste, on the brown of a calico as rough as the camisole of the legendary hunters, the artist Abdoulaye Konaté pays homage to one of their prestigious ancestors, the same one from whom he takes his name, Mamadi Kami Konaté, Nimrod of the bushes and savannahs.
Bertrand Goy, July 2021
(Extract from the forthcoming catalogue)
The exhibition attempts to pay tribute to the Mandé people and to question their origins. It is structured around a historical work by Abdoulaye Konaté.
Part of a series of five pieces, one of which was awarded the Grand Prix Léopold Sédar Senghor at the Dakar Biennale in 1996, Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé (n°4) will be exhibited to the public for the very first time. This historical work draws its inspiration from the founding myths of the Mandé country, the core region of present Mali.
A selection of traditional Bambara sculptures from the ancient Mandé country will be shown, alongside an important statue from the Segou region, made by the master of the "aquiline nose". The statues from this workshop have been attracting the interest of collectors and institutions for over a century. Although the body of these rare sculptures has been well known and studied for a long time, the example unveiled in this exhibition is completely new.
The exhibition is accompanied by a dedicated catalogue in which an essay by Bertrand Goy, a historian specialising in West Africa, is reproduced. This comparative study will reveal the roots of the Mandé, the founding role of the hunters' brotherhood and the traditions attached to them, while placing Abdoulaye Konaté's work in the history of Malian art.