Omar Ba
The artist
Born in 1977 in Senegal, Omar Ba lives and works in Dakar. His paintings, produced using a variety of techniques and materials, represent political and social motifs open to multiple interpretations. His artistic vocabulary raises historical and timeless questions while formulating a wholly contemporary artistic message. Omar Ba’s iconography features personal metaphors, ancestral references and hybrid figures. This combination of heterogeneous elements illustrates his desire to abolish boundaries and categories. His work, with its enigmatic nature and poetic intensity, rejects all forms of didactic narrative, seeking instead to express his subconscious and his symbolic interpretation of the real
Exhibitions
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Kaïdara
October 30 - December 28, 2024
Paris - Grenier Saint Lazare -
Droit du sol – droit de rêver
September 7 - October 29, 2022
New York -
Anomalies
February 4 - March 27, 2021
Brussels -
From the Paper to the Wall
June 6 - July 26, 2019
Brussels -
Autopsie de nos consciences
September 8 – October 27, 2018
Paris - Grenier Saint Lazare -
Eclosion
June 2 - July 23, 2016
Brussels
Biography
| Birth | Born in 1977 in Senegal |
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| Residence | Lives and works in Dakar, Senegal |
| Education | ECAV-MAPS Arts in Public Spheres, Sierre, Switzerland Ecole Supérieure des Beaux-arts, Geneva, Switzerland Ecole National des Beaux-Arts, Senegal |
SOLO EXHIBITIONS (SELECTION)
| 2024 | Kaïdara, TEMPLON, Paris, France Clin d’œil à Cheikh Anta Diop - Un continent à le recherche de son histoire, Siège de l’Organisation des Nations Unies, New York, USA TEMPLON, Paris, France |
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| 2023 | Destins Communs, Kunsthalle, Mulhouse, France |
| 2022 | Omar Ba: Political Animals, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, USA Clin d’oeil, FIAF Gallery, New York, USA Right of Soil – Right to Dream, Templon, New York, USA A Journey Beyond Illusion / Voyage au-delà de l’illusion, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels, Belgium |
| 2021 | Sommation, Wilde, Basel, Switzerland Anomalies, Galerie Templon, Brussels, Belgium |
| 2020 | Same Dream, Contemporary Calgary, Calgary, Canada |
| 2019 | Omar Ba : Visions partagées, Montreal Museum of Fina Arts, Montreal, Canada Same Dream, The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, Toronto, Canada The power of objects, Wilde Gallery, Geneva, Switzerland |
| 2018 | Autopsie de nos consciences, Galerie Templon, Paris, France |
Voir plus
GROUP EXHIBITIONS (SELECTION)
| 2024 | Biennale de Dakar, Sénégal Avant-garde and liberation contemporary art and decolonial modernism, mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna, Austria |
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| 2020 | Global(e) Resistance, Musée national d’art moderne - Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France |
| 2019 | From the Paper to the Wall, Galerie Templon, Brussels, Belgique |
| 2018 | 40 ans de passion, Omar Ba, Prune Nourry, Tunga, Fondation Fernet-Branca, Saint-Louis, France Quel Amour ?!, Musée d’art Contemporain, Marseille, France Afrique. Artistes d’hier et d’aujourd’hui, Fondation Clément, Martinique, France D’Afrique aux Amériques: Picasso en face-à-face, d’hier à aujourd’hui, Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, Montréal, Canada |
| 2017 | Zoocryptage, Crypte Sainte-Eugénie, Biarritz, France Afrique, raconter le monde, Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea, Milano, Italy Le Havre – Dakar, Partager la mémoire, Muséum d'histoire naturelle du Havre, France Art/Afrique, Le Nouvel Atelier, Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris, France En toute modestie – Archipel Di Rosa, Miam Sète, Sète, France Festival Afropolitan, Bozar Brussels, Belgique |
| 2016 | Salon d’Automne, Grand Palais, Paris, France Mauvaises Graines 2, Topographie de l'Art, Paris, France You Go To My Head, Galerie Templon, Brussels, Belgium |
| 2014 | Summer Exhibition 2014, Royal Academy of Arts, London, UK Ici l’Afrique/ Here Africa. L’Afrique contemporaine à travers le regard de ses artistes, Château de Penthes, Geneva, Switzerland Authentik Energie, Le Manoir de la ville de Martigny, Martigny, Switzerland |
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PUBLIC COLLECTIONS (SELECTION)
| Centre National des Arts Plastiques, France | |
| Fonds Municipal d’Art Contemporain (FMAC) de la ville de Paris, France | |
| Collection du Credit Suisse, Switzerland | |
| Collection Louis Vuitton Fondation, France | |
| Collection Mirabaud, Switzerland | |
| Collection Nationale Suisse, Basel, Switzerland | |
| Fonds Municipal d’Art Contemporain (FMAC) de la ville de Genève, Switzerland |
Voir plus
BIBLIOGRAPHY (SELECTION)
| 2022 | Omar Ba, Galerie Templon |
|---|---|
| 2019 | Omar Ba, Same Dream, No. 8, The Power Plant Pages, The Power Plant Contemporary Ar Gallery, under the edirtorship of Gaëtane Verna, Toronto, Canada |
| 2016 | Exhibition catalogue, Mauvaises Graines, Edition Topographie de l'Art, Paris, France |
| 2014 | Omar Ba, La Prophétie des Gens de Durban / The Prophecy of the People of Durban, Hales Gallery, Paris, France |
Press
Beaux-Arts Magazine - November, 2024
Les peintures magiques d'Omar Ba inspirées d'un conte peule réunies dans un livre et une expo
Maïka Bauwens
Artforum - October, 2023
Omar Ba
Brooklyn Rail - December, 2022
Omar Ba, in conversation with Emann Odufu
The Art Newspaper - septembre 2022
Toasting Manhattan's newest galleries and more Armory Week festivities
Agence France-Presse (AFP), repris par le média Konbini Arts - juin 2022
Qui est Omar Ba, l'artiste qui fait sensation en "réinventant" la peinture ?
Reportage à Bambilor de Lucie Peytermann
RFI - mars 2021
L'exposition "Anomalies", de l'artiste sénégalais Omar Ba
Le Vif l'Express - février 2021
Une oeuvre à la loupe
Art Daily - octobre 2019
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts : Omar Ba
Harper's Bazaar Arabia - summer 2019
The Artist : Omar Ba
News
Omar Ba
PROJECT 12
Residency
Palais Garnier, Paris
On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Palais Garnier in 2025, the Opéra national de Paris and the Arop, Association pour le Rayonnement de l’Opéra national de Paris, are launching a unique program, PROJECT 12, an exceptional artists’ residency at the heart of the famous Parisian landmark. Omar Ba is the third artist in residence at the Palais Garnier to be invited to create an exclusive work.
Omar Ba
Atul Dodiya
AVANT-GARDE AND LIBERATION CONTEMPORARY ART AND DECOLONIAL MODERNISM
Group show
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna
From June 7 to September 22, 2024
On the occasion of the group show Avant-Garde and Liberation Contemporary Art and Decolonial Modernism, curated by Christian Kravagna and Matthias Michalka, Omar Ba and Atul Dodiya will be exhibiting their works from June 7, 2024 at the Mumok in Vienna.
Omar Ba
CLIN D’ŒIL À CHEIKH ANTA DIOP-UN CONTINENT À LA RECHERCHE DE SON HISTOIRE
Solo Show
United Nations Headquarters, New York
From May 7 to May 17, 2024
Omar Ba’s work Clin d’œil à Cheikh Anta Diop-Un continent à la recherche de son histoire is this month on view at the United Nations’ headquarters in New York. This project is presented in collaboration with The French Institute Alliance Française. With this wall-sized painting, the artist pays tribute to Senegalese historian and politician Cheikh Anta Diop. This exhibition highlights the cultural relations between France and Senegal, Francophonie as well as our shared heritage.
Omar Ba
SOLO SHOW – DESTINS COMMUNS
La Kunsthalle, Mulhouse
Through October 29, 2023
Omar Ba’s solo show Destins Communs at La Kunsthalle in Mulhouse is on view until October 29, 2023.
Omar Ba
SOLO SHOW – POLITICAL ANIMALS
Baltimore Museum of Art, United States
Through April 2, 2023
On November 20, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) will open the first U.S. museum exhibition of works by acclaimed Senegalese contemporary artist Omar Ba. With Omar Ba: Political Animals, the BMA introduces audiences to the incredible conceptual, social, and political relevance of Ba’s oeuvre as well as to his distinct formal approach, which combines the fine detail associated with drawing and the scale and grandeur of history paintings.
Omar Ba
SOLO SHOW – FOCUS
Omar Ba - Focus
Fine Arts Museum, Belgium
From April 1st to August 7, 2022
Omar Ba’s work is characterized by its enigmatic nature and its great poetic intensity. In contrast with a didactic narrative, he rather seeks to express his subconscious and his symbolic interpretation of reality. The artist deals with themes such as chaos, destruction, and dictatorship, draping his political discourse in a veil of poetry through a pictorial language that is entirely his own, both fierce and delicate.
Omar Ba
SAME DREAM – SOLO SHOW
From September 17, 2020 to January 31, 2021
Contemporary Calgary, 701 11 Street SW, Calgary, Canada
Same Dream brings together several of Ba’s paintings depicting dictators and authority figures, who lead to corrupt and violent regimes across the African continent and in other parts of the world, particularly where the legacies of colonialism persist. At times represented as hybrid beasts—part human, part animal— these despotic warlords are typically enveloped in an abundance of lush flora and fauna. Indeed, nature becomes a recurring force across Ba’s oeuvre.
Omar Ba
Billie Zangewa
GLOBAL(E) RESISTANCE – GROUP SHOW
From July 29 to January 4, 2021
Centre Pompidou, Rue Beaubourg, 75003 Paris
The exhibition ‘Global(e) Restitance’ reveals for the first time, more than sixty artists reunited for the last century around the question of “resitance”, including Senegalese Omar Ba and South African artist Billie Zangewa.
The exhibition that collects many work from many different medium and countries, questions the theoretical and esthetical relationship between politics and art. The idea of resisting, studied through the handling of politic as well as art for activism, as always been experienced by artists under oppression and inequalities.
