Djamel Tatah’s refined paintings reveal the way in which humanity can assert itself as a presence in the world. From reality, ordinary life and world events, the artist paints life-size figures which seem to be suspended in time, set in unspecified places and caught up in a world of silence. Reinterpreting solitude as virtue, Tatah intends to surpass reality, experimenting with colour, light and line to explore his feelings of being part of the world.

“My painting is silent, and imposing silence on all the chaos of life is almost like making a political statement. It allows one to step back and examine one’s relationship to others and to society as a whole”.

The Franco-Algerian artist studied in France at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts of Saint-Etienne from 1981 to 1986. He has taught at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris since 2008. 

Zoulikha Bouabdellah is a multi-disciplinary Franco-Algerian artist who explores various techniques including photography, video, drawing and installation. After growing up in Algiers, she moved in 1993 to France and obtained her masters in 2002 from ENSBA Paris-Cergy.

Her works reflect on the impacts of globalization, analyzing culture, production, and industrialization. She questions global issues related to sexuality, conflicts, or the status of women by juxtaposing these geopolitical dynamics to representations of icons, motifs, and ornaments. In 2003, she directed the video Dansons (Let’s Dance), in which the French and Algerian cultures are merged, depicting a belly dance to the Marseillaise, the French national anthem. In 2005, her work featured in the seminal exhibition Africa Remix at the Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris). In 2008, she was selected for the festival Paradise Now! Essential French Avant-garde Cinema 1890-2008 at the Tate Modern (London). 

“I have no intention of championing antinomy; I prefer the idea of cohesion.”