Contemporary Artists from Gabon
Imago Mundi - Luciano Benetton Collection

Texts by Luciano Benetton, Liliana Malta, Jean Nziengui Moungonou

A collection that focuses on "la terre mère", the harmony of nature and the cosmos expressed through the female figure, bearer of fertility and life. A collection in which ‘the eternal Black Mother’ is the symbol of a country and a continent, able to feed our imagination, mixing the old with the allure, no less wild and fiery, of new times. With original pictorial languages and extraordinary colours, the artists of Gabon open to the world and simultaneously affirm ancient traditions. Like the tribal and mystical fang masks, closely related to funeral rites, which influenced an avant-garde artist like Picasso. Mesmerized by their power he said, “The masks weren’t just like any other pieces of sculpture. Not at all. They were magic things. They were against everything - against unknown threatening spirits”.

Gabon: Eternal Black Mother is an Imago Mundi collection, a cultural, democratic, global, non-profit project, promoted by Luciano Benetton with the aim of creating the widest possible mapping of the different contemporary artistic experiences of our world. In Imago Mundi, each country is represented by the works of established artists and new talents, commissioned with the maximum freedom of expression, whose only constraint is the 10x12 cm format.

www.imagomundiart.com is the web platform of the entire project.