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His gallery is the only one in sub-Saharan Africa among the 199 galleries of 29 countries present at the FIAC 2019, the great rendezvous of art in Paris. Interview with Cécile Fakhoury, daughter of Parisian gallery owners and beautiful daughter of Ivorian-Lebanese architect Pierre Fakhoury. In 2018, she opened the first art gallery in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, in 2018 a second, in Dakar, Senegal, and a few weeks ago offices in Paris.
RFI : With a gallery in Dakar and another in Abidjan, what does it mean for you to have been selected for the first time here at FIAC, one of the best contemporary art fairs in the world ?
Cécile Fakhoury : This represents a great accomplishment. We are very happy to be here. Participating in FIAC is a real dynamic. We are a gallery of contemporary art on the African continent. We represent many African artists. But, finally, we also wanted to integrate progressively international markets, without systematically having this label "contemporary African art".
► See also: [Video] A Cameroonian gallery at "Art Paris"
Why did you choose to present at the FIAC a solo exhibition of the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts ?
It's a story that has not been premeditated. It is an artist born in Ivory Coast, left in the United States, there are about thirty years. He lived several years in Paris, because he studied here the fine arts. In November 2018, an exhibition Ouattara Watts was made in Abidjan to show off this Ivorian artist who is unknown or very poorly known by the public and Ivorian collectors. There were many local African collectors who mobilized and supported the work of Ouattara Watts.
Paris is also a city where one does not know one's work well. So, it's also a kind of come back to show this work here at FIAC. For some, it's a total discovery. But there is the generation of Ouattara Watts [ born in 1957, ed. ] Collectors who say to themselves: "But, I know this work, I saw it at the Documenta, at the Biennial of Venice, at the Smithsonian ... "These are stories that reconnect.
You show a series of paintings specially made by Ouattara Watts in 2018 and 2019 for the FIAC. What is its specificity ?
All of Watts' work is to create spaces, to reconstruct and tell something that could unite us all over our heads. A kind of cosmos, with many elements, on the edge of many cultures and worlds. Which is inherent to itself. There is an entire African culture, ancestral, that draws from its deep roots: masks, Baoulé forms, a kind of gorilla, the spirit, like an incarnated dance ... These paintings are on the border of many worlds: stories both mystical and very contemporary that characterize the life of Ouattara Watts.
To acquire a painting by the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts at FIAC in Paris, count 50-60,000 euros.
© Siegfried Forster / RFICanvas from the series "La Dama", by the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts, exhibited at the Cécile Fakhoury Gallery, at FIAC 2019, in Paris.
© Siegfried Forster / RFICanvas (detail) of the "La Dama" series, by the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts, exhibited at the Cécile Fakhoury Gallery, at FIAC 2019 in Paris.
© Siegfried Forster / RFICanvas (detail) of the "La Dama" series, by the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts, exhibited at the Cécile Fakhoury Gallery, at FIAC 2019 in Paris.
© Siegfried Forster / RFICanvas (detail) of the "La Dama" series, by the Ivorian artist Ouattara Watts, exhibited at the Cécile Fakhoury Gallery, at FIAC 2019 in Paris.
© Siegfried Forster / RFI
Are you surprised that there are only two galleries based in Africa among the 199 galleries present at FIAC ? Tunisian Selma Feriani shows the conceptual and abstract work of Saudi artist Maha Malluh. You yourself are the only gallery in sub-Saharan Africa.
Indeed, I am the only one. Perhaps, because there is a lack of knowledge of the African market that is developing. His recognition grows. Today, we have more and more keys of reading to know and understand this market, its artists and its actors. It's a story in progress. I imagine that there are more and more galleries from the African continent and also galleries around the world that will represent more and more African artists. For me, it's clear, the African scene will be more and more present.
As a Parisian, was it the right decision to settle in Abidjan seven years ago ?
Yes. It's an extraordinary story. I opened the gallery in 2012, not knowing absolutely what it could give. I had no references, no templates, no business plan, I did not have much information to know what it could give. It is the conjunction of many things that has made it start, evolve, grow and develop in the right direction. Yes, opening these spaces in Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal is not an obvious highway. But this African presence is very exciting. It develops daily. It's a story that can really fit into a duration.
Do you still make 90% of your turnover outside the countries in which you operate ?
For a long time, there was a real imbalance between the turnover made abroad and the local turnover. It's rebalancing a bit. We are not yet at 50:50, but with the development of the gallery in Dakar, with all that we develop locally, we manage to balance that. At one point, I thought, it is not possible to develop a local market from Europe, from the United States, from the outside. There was no sense. And the opening of Dakar was exactly that reflection. To anchor and make exist this history, artists, to take our collectors, to find new collectors in this dynamic.
And it works well. All my collectors and the people who are starting to look at us - with a lot of questioning - see that I believed in this continent. I could have opened a gallery in Brussels, Paris or elsewhere in Europe. But, I decided to make my development on the African continent, in another African country, in Senegal. It was a very positive signal that I sent to people who follow us. And I believe it terribly. All this is very long, very laborious, very tedious, but also very exciting.
You exchange with collectors in Europe and Africa. Are they impacted by the debate around the restitution of ancient African works ?
It is a subject that fascinates the crowds and is very interesting, even for us contemporary galleries. For me and my collectors of contemporary art, there is no direct influence related to the restitution. But, there are real questions and a real awareness that is being made. I, as a young gallery in Africa, representing African artists, my observation is that many works leave the continent. We are trying to rebalance things. We try to capture a local audience and local collectors to develop this market, but the reality is still: many works leave the African continent. If this continues like this, in ten, fifty or a hundred years, we will continue to see our African artists in Europe and the United States. So, there is also an awareness of contemporary collectors to say that there is a kind of responsibility to retain culture on the African soil. And this debate is very relevant to us today, because it is a tool for raising awareness of African culture.
► To read also : Felwine Sarr on the restitution: "to act of justice and rebalancing"
► To read also : Journey of the worlds: the ancient African arts and the restitution
► FIAC 2019 (International Contemporary Art Fair), Paris, from 17 to 20 October.