Culture: birds in the spotlight at the “Volatile” exhibition in Dakar
Audio 01:48
Sculpture by Mauritanian artist Oumar Ball on display at the Manège gallery in Dakar Rfi / Charlotte Idrac
Text by: RFI Follow
4 min
It is the gradual resumption of cultural activities in Senegal, after a total closure linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
In Dakar, art galleries welcome a limited and masked public, but a new exhibition is notably to be discovered at the gallery le Manège, of the French Institute: "Volatile".
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With our correspondent in Dakar,
Charlotte Idrac
The signed soundtrack gives an idea of the atmosphere at the Manège gallery: flying migrants, in wire and recycled metal, created by the Mauritanian Oumar Ball, seem to dialogue with the birds painted by the Senegalese Ousmane Niang.
The birds are here symbols of freedom.
Oumar Ball observed them for a long time, as a child, in the valley of the Senegal River.
“
This freedom that I couldn't have because of all these people saying, '
No, you can't do that.'
You can't go there.
''
These feathers that are on the ground are the feathers that they are trying to take away from me
”.
Ousmane Niang's birds take on human form.
For him, feathers are like weights, bad thoughts.
One of the artists puts the feathers in the washing machine, the other gets rid of them in front of a fan.
The painter uses a pointillist technique of his own, with dots in dots.
Bringing the two artists together was obvious for Olivia Marsaud, director of the Manège gallery.
“
Me, I call it the conference of the birds.
It is always the one that allows us to see higher.
And then today in the streets of Dakar, with the sellers of birds, we make wishes and we make our wish go with the bird.
It's beautiful.
We are always in this idea of poetry, freedom and flight
.
"
An exhibition until October 31 to visit headphones to the ears, with a musical selection linked to the theme of birds.
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