Alioune Diagne discusses his unique artistic style, socially engaged themes, and Senegal’s debut in ‘Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere’, curated by Adriano Pedrosa.
Installation view. Photographer: Laurent Edeline. © Courtesy of the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Brussels — New York
Alioune Diagne, a trailblazing artist from Senegal, has earned international acclaim for his innovative “figuro-abstro” style, which intricately blends figurative imagery with abstract calligraphic elements. Diagne’s work takes centre stage as the Senegal Pavilion debuts at the 60th Venice Biennale, offering profound insights into the daily life and broader social issues affecting Senegal and the African diaspora. Through his art, Diagne addresses pressing themes such as ecology, women’s role in society, discrimination, and heritage while fostering a universal language of connection and shared humanity. In collaboration with art critic and curator Massamba Mbaye, Diagne’s exhibition “Bokk – Bounds” powerfully responds to the Biennale’s theme, ‘Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere’, urging viewers to explore our common bonds amidst global diversity. In this interview, Diagne delves into his unique artistic approach, the socially engaged messages behind his work, and his journey as an artist representing Senegal on the world stage.
ART AFRICA: How does your artistic style, described as “figuro-abstro,” blend figurative scenes with abstract elements inspired by calligraphy? How do you use this to portray daily life in Senegal and the African diaspora?
Alioune Diagne: My style, called “figuro-abstro,” involves creating figurative images and life scenes from a multitude of abstract elements, which I call my unconscious signs. This technique, developed in 2013, visually resembles calligraphy. The year 2013 was marked by the death of my grandfather, who was a Quranic master. His work with Arabic calligraphy was on my mind when he passed away, and I started to paint scenes with calligraphy almost instinctively. My paintings include this universal language, this new alphabet that everyone can interpret as they wish. It allows the expression of things that can’t be conveyed with words. With this technique, I paint scenes from life that have made an impression on me in Senegal, as well as my ten years in France and my travels, especially in the United States. In my studio, I recreate these Senegalese life scenes and snapshots showing the daily life of the African diaspora worldwide. I aim to show authentic images away from stereotypes, capturing the atmospheres and vibrations that touched me. My country, Senegal, is constantly evolving, and I want to immortalize our customs and traditions before they vanish by creating a future archive.
Alioune Diagne, Mbëggeel – Love Bounds, 2024. Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100cm. Photographer: Laurent Edeline. © Courtesy of the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Brussels — New York.
Could you elaborate on the socially engaged themes in your work, such as ecology, the role of women in society, discrimination, and heritage, and how you explore this in your paintings?
There are a lot of critical current issues that matter to me, and I want to use my paintings to communicate this. I focus on how foreign powers, with fishing licenses from the Senegalese government, are overfishing Senegal’s waters. The overfishing has led to a fish shortage in Senegal, which I want to call out. The local traditional dish, rice with fish called “thiéboudiène,” has become something Senegalese people can’t afford anymore because fish has become rare and expensive. To show these problems, I paint scenes like a fisherman returning from an unsuccessful fishing trip in Senegal. You can see fishermen actively unloading from a canoe, but there’s no fish in sight. They’re worn out and come back empty-handed. I also depict the fallout from the fish shortage by showing fishermen who’ve become migrant smugglers or migrants themselves. I want to highlight through these sea migration scenes the dangers of illegal migration and how governments’ indifference leads to people dying because they have no other way to make a living. I also aim to alert Senegalese and African youth through the scenes I paint about the dangers of migration and the harsh realities of life awaiting them in Europe. I often depict the daily life of the modou-modou, Senegalese immigrant workers living off odd jobs, often illegally. Despite all this, I always try to bring a touch of hope. For example, when I paint scenes of migrant boat rescues after being shipwrecked, I want to show that it’s always possible to lend a helping hand. Through my paintings, I also speak out against racism, pollution, and resource depletion. I also want to promote essential values, like passing on traditions, education, community living, courage, and the strength of women in general, and Senegalese women in particular. They’re real heroines in my eyes: super active, selling goods in markets while taking care of their families. I often show them in action in everyday scenes.
What role does Massamba Mbaye, the art critic, curator, and historian, play in your collaboration with the Senegalese Ministry of Culture and Historical Heritage for the exhibition at the Senegalese Pavilion?
I worked on the “Bokk – Bounds” project in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture of Senegal for almost two years with curator Massamba Mbaye, who’s been following my work for several years. Ultimately, we spent a lot of time thinking about what the project meant and discussed the concept of “Bokk” (what we share in common). Our conversations and his curatorial insights contributed to how I shaped the paintings.
Alioune Diagne, Immigrant Children, 2023-2024. Acrylic on canvas, 200 x 200cm. Photographer: Laurent Edeline. © Courtesy of the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Brussels — New York.
Can you tell us more about how the exhibition unfolds in the broader context of the biennale theme “Foreigners Everywhere”?
Through sixteen paintings that together form a twelve-metre by four-metre mosaic display, plus an installation, I’m calling for unity and the cultivation of connections. The “Bokk – Bounds” project responds to the 2024 Venice Biennale theme, “Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere.” In Wolof, “Bokk” means what we share and what we have in common, and it also refers to family ties. By extension, it speaks to our shared humanity. The project starts with the idea that we are all strangers, illustrated through 16 diverse paintings in terms of size, perspectives, and geographical areas depicted. For example, there are scenes of a migrant rescue in the Mediterranean, market scenes in Africa, an image of a homeless person in Europe suffering in indifference, street life in New York, a ceremony in Senegal, and a reinterpretation of the murder of George Floyd. These 16 paintings can stand alone and will be dispersed after the Biennale, symbolizing the scattered African diaspora worldwide. I aim to show that, despite our differences, we are interdependent and connected by shared values like child education, tradition transmission, sharing, and meeting others. Visually, I call for weaving connections by linking scenes through my artistic style, a standard colour palette, and patterns subtly extending from one artwork to another. I bring together what, at first glance, seems foreign. For example, I’ve inverted Darwin’s evolution drawing from ape to man and let it subtly flow across all the paintings. This depiction also serves as a commentary on how viewing others as strangers can bring out a primal, almost wild side in people—something we must fight against. In my project, I urge us to reconnect with our shared values depicted in the joyful scenes on the right side of the display, while the left side portrays what divides us and the current tragedies affecting humanity. I’ve also placed a traditional canoe in the Senegalese pavilion, a type used by both fishermen and migrants. I broke the canoe to symbolize the fracture in human connections and wrapped it in a fabric covered with my signs, visually retying the bonds. The signs I’ve created form a universal symbolic language everyone can understand, conveying what is challenging to express in words.
Alioune Diagne, Transition, 2023-2024. Acrylic on canvas, 200 x 300cm (each), 400 x 300cm. Photographer: Laurent Edeline. © Courtesy of the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Brussels — New York.
Please tell us about your journey as an artist since 2011 and your inclusion in Senegal’s Domaine Privé Artistique de l’Etat (DPAE) collection. And what’s next for you?
Since 2011, I’ve worked on a wide variety of artistic projects. 2013 was the year I started developing my movement, figuro-abstro, which I’ve experimented with in many projects and exhibitions from a project in Shanghai, solo shows in Basel, Aosta in Italy in 2017, the “Perceptions” exhibition in Paris in 2019, and “Wonema – let me see” in Dakar in 2020. In 2022, I was selected for the 14th Biennale of Contemporary African Art in Dakar at the Old Courthouse and, at the same time, did a solo show, “Ettü Kër – Inner Courtyard”, about Senegalese memory at the Grand Théâtre National de Dakar, which was part of the Special Pavilions of the Dakar Biennale. After that, the institution added one of my paintings to the Domaine Privé Artistique de l’Etat (DPAE) in Senegal. With the Galerie Templon, I did a solo show in 2023 called “Tukki” about displacements at Galerie Templon in Brussels and an exhibition on clandestine migration issues called “Seede” (witness) at Galerie Templon in Paris early in 2024. This exhibition follows up on an important project for me, my “Ndox – Glint” (sparkling water) exhibition at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rouen, which was a dialogue with Impressionist masters like Claude Monet, Eugène Boudin, Alfred Sisley, that show dealt with fishing, and the importance of the river in Senegal, also touching on clandestine migration issues. I’ve also recently participated in several group shows, including at the Norval Foundation in Cape Town, where I won the 2023 Public Vote Prize, and at Kunsthal KAdE in Amersfoort, Netherlands, for the Africa Supernova exhibition in 2024. Today, it’s a real honour for me to represent Senegal in its first participation at the Biennale di Venezia. It’s a project I’ve been working on intensely for almost two years in collaboration with curator Massamba Mbaye. I’m also prepping several new projects, all incredibly close to my heart.
The Senegal Pavilion is on view until the 24th of November, 2024.
