Sadikou Oukpedjo

The gesture and expressiveness of Sadikou Oukpedjo are driven by doubts and apprehensions of the world as he sees it. For him, the animal world is a source of essential questioning for man humans to find his place in our societies, at the risk to lose sight of certain values, traditions and precepts of nature. The process of questioning our deep origins finds its roots in the human need of gaining access to the knowledge of oneself, through multiple and ancestral attempts - cosmogony, rituals, sorcery, magic. Henceforth, the work of Sadikou Oukpedjo is one of them. His representations are filled with and penetrated by the invisible and its power, by the unknown and the hidden. Man analyses the world, models the nature, tries to know the secrets which one will be able to use. He is a magician, a master, an illusionist, a savant, when the essence of live inevitably transforms itself and transcends the world of ideas. ...

Galerie Cecile Fakhoury opened its doors in Abidjan, Ivory Coast in September 2012. In May 2018, the gallery inaugurated its second space in Dakar, Senegal and a showroom in Paris, France. Shortly after, in March 2020, a new project space dedicated to emerging artists from Africa opened in Abidjan. In October 2021, Galerie Cecile Fakhoury inaugurated another gallery, opening in the 8th arrondissement of Paris on Avenue Matignon. The gallery promotes contemporary art from Africa and the Diaspora by providing visibility to the artistic diversity and creative spirit from the continent. Through its programming of solo and group exhibitions, participation in international art fairs, biennales, and collaboration with international galleries, Cecile Fakhoury is a leading force putting contemporary African art on the global map. The artists represented by the gallery are distinguished by their cultural identities and stories, they create a new language that crosses geographical boundaries and familiarities. They are observers of the world they live in, critics of society, and committed to their positions living within complex histories. In turn, they ask us to reconsider our own relation to the world. ...