MABEYE DEME

Born in 1979 in Tokyo. Lives and works between France and Sénégal.

The daily life of the city of Dakar is magnified and transcended by the objective of this photographer who, placed behind his tent canvas, thus manages to capture the intimate moments of its inhabitants. Unlike the painter who prints his motif on the canvas, the photographer veils the lens to better reveal his subject. Clean canvas, blurred figure. Mabeye Deme uses the delicate texture of the veil as a medium, like the developer of silver or the pixels of digital.

The tents in which he finds space are ephemeral constructions of working-class neighborhoods that host all kinds of ceremonies and meetings. Usury tells of the passage of time, the ruptures and the distance of the exile with a city that still shies away from its present.

Invited in residence at the Blachère Foundation for Contemporary African Art in Apt (France) in 2013, his work was then exhibited at the Dak’Art Off biennial in Senegal in 2014 and then at Unesco in Paris in 2016. He was also exhibited in Marseille, Auxerre, Lyon and Grenoble.