The exhibition presents a core group of works representative of Binta Diaw’s research into the relationship between the body and the landscape. For the artist, the connection between body, identity, and natural context offers a means of investigating the political and social processes underlying themes of memory, lineage, and belonging, continually expanding the field of experience from the individual to the collective. The selection of works on view traces different moments in Diaw’s artistic production, from 2019 to the present, beginning with the photographic medium in the series Paysage Corporels (2019–ongoing), moving to video with Essere Corpo (2019), and culminating in installation with Reeni Yakar – les racines de l’espoir (2022).
Paysage Corporels is a black-and-white photographic series depicting portions of the artist’s body. Separated from the whole, these fragments take on the appearance of natural landscapes—plains, hills, mountainous areas. The artist often intervenes directly on the images with soft pastel colors, tracing the delicate outlines of trees, fruits, and roots, generating, in the artist’s words, “lianas of genealogies, laden with temporality, through which it is always possible to discover, discover oneself, and imagine the continuation of the narrative.” The Black body and the artist’s self-portrait are also central to Essere Corpo (2019), a video documentation of a performance. The work captures a bodily dance composed of movements and breathing in close contact with a grassy surface, in a forest that filters the sunlight. The choreography gradually becomes an emancipatory dance, in which body and landscape come together and move apart, as in a process of healing one’s own wounds, both visible and invisible.
Also on view is the installation Reeni Yakar – les racines de l’espoir (2022), part of the mangrove cycle. Inspired by formations of woody plants found in numerous areas of the African continent, these installations take the form of shelters constructed from braids of synthetic black hair, suspended from the ceiling until they meet the ground. The work is presented in a site-specific installation that employs a uniform layer of earth, interrupted by inlets.
The exhibition was preceded, on May 18, 2024, by the unveiling of a large billboard conceived by the artist, depicting a Paysage Corporel, in the Art Park of the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Guarene. The billboard and the exhibition in Alba outline a path leading toward the exhibition project dedicated to the same artist, which will take place from June 20 to October 13, 2024, at the Turin venue of the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo. This is a solo exhibition by Binta Diaw (Il peut pleurer du ciel), consisting of a large video installation conceived for the occasion. The exhibition in Turin is curated by Ilaria Bernardi and co-produced by the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo and Associazione Genesi, as part of the third edition of Progetto Genesi. Arte e Diritti Umani, promoted by the latter association.
Biografia
BINTA DIAW was born in 1995 in Milan, where she currently lives and works. In 2022, she became the first winner of the Franco-Italian Pujade-Lauraine Prize. Recent exhibitions include those at: Madre, Naples (2022); Centrale Fies, Dro (2022); Galerie Cécile Fakhoury, Dakar (2022); Bungalow ChertLüdde, Berlin (2022); Casa Testori, Milan (2022); Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Paris (2022); MA*GA, Gallarate, Milan (2020); Savvy Contemporary, Berlin (2019). In 2024, she was among the finalists for the MAXXI Prize.
