Abdoulaye Konaté is represented in ‘How Far How Near’ in the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. Till February 1, 2015.
Symphonie Bleue, 2011.
About:
The Abdoulaye Konaté textile sculptures are inexhaustible matter in which he listed the signs and symbols of secret societies in Mali (“Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé” – 1994) or an interpretation of the world and events (“Bosnie, Rwanda, Angola” – 1995). With this material, he dyes, cuts, sews to have a structure for operating the flat surface of the fabric. This can become the support of growths that create optical effects. Gradually the assembly of these items obliterates the presence of the figure and plays with volumes, infinity of folds, rebounds, hollows, crevices (“Symphonie Bleue” – 2007).The density of the material allows him to dance forms in a setting designed to abstraction (“La danse d’une nuit” – 2009).
At first, he was influenced by Bocar Keita paintings, the only painter in his hometown, then joined the National Institute of Arts of Mali, Bamako. Mali in this time, a «non-aligned» country of communist influence, allows him to continue his training in Cuba, at the Institute of Fine Arts in Havana and to be influenced by Wilfredo Lam paintings and other great painters surrealists. They strongly mark his drawing and painting, including his serie «Ciwara» and many others until today, often characterized by the representation of African stereotypes (masks, antelope, zebu horns …).
African Feast, 2012 (in collection Stedelijk)
In the ninety, with large tapestries of traditional malian cotton, he worked a new creative process by looking at space and volume. Materials founding of his work, these textile sculptures reveal a deeply conscious world of economic and social challenges. It takes commitment and policy positions dealing with social, political and economic problems such as AIDS (patchwork of 6000 m2 covering the stadium during the opening ceremony of the ACN, 2002 Africa Cup of Nations in Bamako) or global crises (Gris-gris blancs pour Israël et la Palestine – 2006) … in contemporary approach. But textile support is also to evoke the essence of Manding culture, with or without literal quotes to tradition with the famous serie «Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé» in 1994.
Composition avec Plumes.
Artist of the matter, Abdoulaye Konate combines hanging, assembly, dyeing and sculpture to achieve high recall and strong presence in space. With textiles, gris-gris, bullets, used clothing or sand, he comes in the theater and the world of contemporary art through the door or spiritual or political. Reflecting a Malian, African and universal collective consciousness.
Gris Gris Blancs, 2005.
In 1996, he received the «Grand Prix Leopold Sedar Senghor» in Dakar Biennale. He participated in exhibitions in Belgium, France, Spain, USA, Japan… He lives and works in Mali. Currently director of the «Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers Multimedia» in Bamako, Mali, he experiments new unprecedented pedagogies in Africa.
(From Revue Noir, March 2012)
