Gerard Quenum: Traces, Art Twenty One, May 2, 2015, 6 PM

Art Twenty One presents a solo exhibition of Porto-Novo based artist Gerard Quenum opening on March 2, 2015. Gérard Quenum works in disparate artistic practices including painting, drawing, and sculpture. His sculptural works incorporate recovered materials such as toy dolls and scraps of wood, referencing ambiguous spiritual and ritual associations. In recent works on canvas, Quenum has expanded his normative practice to explore the processes of sketching. His paintings depict crudely drawn figures that protrude on a blank picture plane, floating as ghostly and unidentifiable presences.

Gérard Quenum is a self-taught artist who began his practice as part of an emerging generation of artists in Benin known as Boulev’art. Recent solo exhibitions include Gérard Quenum: Rupture at the Fondation Zinsou (Cotonou), Dolls Never Die at the October Gallery (London), and The Dragon Between Two Worlds at the Museu Afro-Brasil (São Paulo). Quenum has completed artist residencies at the Ateliers d’Allonnes (France), the Kereva Museum of Art (Finland), and the Museo Afro-Brasil (Brazil). His work is included in the collections of the British Museum, the Pigozzi Collection, the National Museum of Scotland, the Government of Benin, Galeria Bernardo Marques, the Cantor Arts Center, the Fondation Zinsou, and the Africa Museum.