PRINCE GALLA GNOHITÉ

Born in 1989 in Ivory Coast. Lives and works in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.
The theme of “street children” — a phenomenon that is both common and often scandalous — can be found in the artistic creation of visual artists from a number of countries.

In the Ivory Coast, this was crystallized in the political and institutional crisis which destabilized the social structures of this country for several years and swarms of children and adolescents into the streets, condemned to live and to “play” at war, but with real weapons. We call these children “microbes” or “grazers”.

Fortunately, peace has returned, weapons are now toys and the children of poor neighborhoods are, like all children in the world, in search of age appropriate pleasures and diversions, their ingenuity making up for their lack of resources. How the faces and attitudes of these children have changed!

HENRI ABRAHAM UNIVERS

Born in 1974 in Paris 8th, France Lives and works in London, UK When you have lived a hundred lives, in a hundred places around the world, is it any wonder that you would choose to call yourself Henri Abraham Univers?

Henri Abraham’s origins are in France and Burkina Faso. He studied cinema and practiced many trades in his life among these countries and other places (notably the Ivory Coast and London where he currently lives.) Is it surprising then that he would become a fine artist whose works express something universal and cosmic?

Arriving late to fine arts creation and after exploring other forms of artistic expression, Henri Abraham Univers realized that painting was his path. As he was approaching his forties in 2013, he left all his other activities to devote himself to this path. Encouraged by a Polish artist, he presented works for the highly selective exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, in London. To his surprise, after only a year of practice he found himself there, among nearly twenty thousand other candidates.

MÉNÉ

Born 1977, Ivory Coast. Lives and works in Dabou (Ivory Coast).

Méné continues to promenade the improbable silhouettes of his characters through his work and through our lives and we are grateful for the sweetness and the color he gives them. Graduate of INSAAC (Abidjan School of Fine Arts) and certified professor of fine arts, Méné goes his way, without unnecessary hype, but with stubbornness and talent.

More and more art collectors appreciate his many talents that are expressed in his high quality painted works. With Méné it's about painting, the artist having never departed from this medium to express his feelings, visions, dreams and his moments of melancholy. Painting is surely his way of expressing emotions, a man in his forties, who does not speak much, is sparing in his gestures, laughter and tears.

Everything is in the richly colored work, he has pursued for years. We know him for his use of various supports, paper, canvas, plastic sheeting on which painters in building had left. Everything is good for him then, by the magic of color, reinterpret things and give them the turn he wanted.