Press Release - September 18, 2015
What Changes, What Transforms, What Remains
PHOTOQUAI RESIDENCES FROM 2012 TO 2014
Display from 17 September 2015 to 17 January 2016
Since 2008 the musée du quai Branly has run an annual program to support contemporary creative
photography. The PHOTOQUAI RESIDENCES have enabled twenty artists and photographers from
Africa, America, Asia and the Pacific to complete an artistic project. At the end of each residence,
a selection of images is taken and produced by the museum, to be included in its photography
collections.
This display features a selection of works created by the prize-winners from the last three years.
These works allow us to explore the idea of transformation.
Nyaba Léon Ouedraogo uses before and after photographs to achieve an ephemeral transformation
of his models for the day, questioning their social position. By giving these women who have
been ostracised following accusations of witchcraft the option to embody a new person through
the image, he is making a transitory response to a long-term situation. The exhibition of these
photographs is a new phase in the changing view of these women, who up until now have been
invisible.
Che Onejoon offers an interpretation of the way in which connections between several African
countries and North Korea are documented. He photographs monuments recently designed and
constructed by the North Korean company Mansudae in Senegal, Botswana and the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. The North Korean iconography is perpetuated by and embedded within
these constructions; Che Onejoon’s frontal views emphasize their monumentality.
Sameer Tawde uses photography to capture the changing appearances of Indian miracle robots.
These articulated machines representing mythical figures are presented in varied contexts of
use, and in recent years are being gradually replaced by new technologies. By focusing on these
machines which are on the verge of becoming obsolete, Sameer Tawde gets into their very core,
without destroying their capacity for magic.
Display from 17 September 2015 to 17 January 2016 in the Cabinet of Graphic Arts in the
permanent collection space at the Musée du quai Branly.
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Nyaba Léon OUEDRAOGO, Les Dévoreuses d’Âmes
[The Soul Eaters] - Residence in Burkina Faso in 2013
PHOTOQUAI 2013 RESIDENCE, Les Dévoreuses d’Ames (The Soul
Eaters), Nyaba Léon Ouedraogo © musée du quai Branly
This body of work is inspired by the collective belief linked to “the soul eaters”. The women described in
this way are typically elderly women, who are marginalized and regarded as witches by their community.
They are often abandoned and driven away from their families.
The photographer has taken images of several women, initially in their everyday lives, as they appear in
their life on a daily basis, then clothed in other outfits of their choice, which enable them to envisage
themselves in a new social role. Presented in the form of a diptych, he brings the two images together and
thereby suggests the creation of a social representation, of which these women are both the agents and
the victims.
By asking these women to give their own interpretation of the image that society has attributed to them,
the artist questions more broadly the position and image of women in society in Burkina Faso.
Che ONEJOON, A Monumental Tour
Residence in several African countries in 2012
For this project, Che Onejoon, a South Korean photographer, sought to
investigate the real estate and architectural contracts which have linked
North Korea to several African countries since the 1970s.
In fact, it is the same company, Mansudae Studio based in Pyongyang,
which has produced the statues of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il, the
Tiglachin Monument in Ethiopia, the African Renaissance Monument in
Senegal and the Presidential Palaces in Namibia and Madagascar.
In the course of this project, Che Onejoon carried out a survey of these
statues and monuments produced according to the rules of socialistrealist monumental art. The final series is composed of photographs of
these monuments taken by the artist, primarily as frontal views.
PHOTOQUAI 2012 RESIDENCE, Senegal, African Renaissance, Dakar 2013, Che Onejoon
© musée du quai Branly
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Sameer TAWDE, Miracle Robots
Residence in India in 2014
PHOTOQUAI 2014 RESIDENCE, India, Miracle Robots, Sameer Tawde
© musée du quai Branly
This project, begun in 2009, is based on the Indian culture of robots and automatons. The photographer
dates the start of this popular movement to the mid-1970s, a movement which would take the use of
automatons from the field of entertainment to that of worship. The photographer focused on the
automatons themselves as objects linked to the mythological tradition, but also on the people who build,
repair and use these robots, specifically in his home city of Mumbai. Sameer Tawde stresses that these
obsolete machines retain their efficacy as vehicles for dreams and desires. His photographs show the close
visual interconnection between humans and machines.
The other winners since 2008 are:
2008
Sammy Baloji (Democratic Republic of the Congo), Allers et retours, residence in France
Lourdes Grobet (Mexico), Equilibre et Résistance, residence in Alaska
Wu QI (China), La Chine Catholique rurale, residence in China
2009
Pablo Bartholomew (India), Les Indiens de France, residence in France
Wayne Liu (Taiwan), This is Belgrade, residence in Serbia
2010
Cinthya Soto (Costa Rica), Paysage (re)trouvé : à la recherche du paradis perdu, residence in South America
Fiona Pardington (New Zealand), Whakaahua: The pressure of Sunlight falling, residence in France
Roberto Caceres (Peru), Chifa, la culture chinoise au Pérou, Residence in Peru
2011
João Castilho (Brazil), Vade retro, residence in Brazil
Hak Kim (Cambodia), Someone, residence in Cambodia
Andrew Esiebo (Nigeria), Pride, residence in West Africa
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2012
Lek Kiatsirikajorn (Thailand), Lost in Paradise, residence in Thailand
Hugo Aveta (Argentina), SOMA, le temps habite, residence in several countries in South America
2013
Daniela Edburg (Mexico), Wadmal - The sample project Iceland
Pedro David (Brazil), 360 metros quadrados (360 square meters)
2014
Hyung-Geun Park (South Korea), The Tumen River Project, residence in South Korea, China and Russia
Mehrdad Naraghi (Iran), Japanese Gardens, residence in Japan
The PHOTOQUAI’S RESIDENCIES have benefited from sponsorship from the Total Foundation between
2008 and 2012 and from Crédit Agricole CIB in 2013 and 2014.
Press contacts
PHOTOQUAI – THE BIENNIAL
MUSÉE DU QUAI BRANLY
Heymann, Renoult Associées, Agnès Renoult
+33 (0)1 44 61 76 76
www.heymann-renoult.com
French press: Eléonore Grau, [email protected]
International press: Julie Oviedo, j.oviedo@heymann-renoult.
com
Communications department
Nathalie Mercier, Communications Director
33(0)1 56 61 70 20 - [email protected]
Magalie Vernet, Deputy Director of the communications
department and Media Relations Manager
33 (0) 1 56 61 52 87 - [email protected]
Christel MORETTO, Media Relations Officer
33(0) 1 56 61 53 48 - [email protected]
Thibaud Giraudeau, Media Relations Officer
33(0)1 56 61 70 52 - [email protected]
[email protected]
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