dimanche 12 juillet 2020

Manuel Mendive

Manuel Mendive — Untitled (Oshun and Shango),1991


Mendive Hoyo Manuel, né à La Havane, Cuba en 1944.

Issu d’une famille pratiquant la Santería, Manuel Mendive Hoyo est aujourd’hui considéré comme un des artistes cubains les plus importants, et une figure majeure de « l’Afro-cubanisme » dans le domaine des arts plastiques. En 1962, il obtient les diplômes de peinture et sculpture de l’Academia de Artes Plásticas San Alejandro de la Havane et présente deux ans plus tard sa première exposition personnelle au Centre of Art de la Havane. Par la suite, ses œuvres seront exposées à l’international : Le pavillon cubain de la XLIIe biennale de Venise en 1988 lui a consacré une personnelle. Ses œuvres sont présentes dans de nombreux musées et galeries dont le Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de la Havane, le Musée national d'art moderne – Centre Georges Pompidou, mais aussi des musées en Russie, Somalie, Congo, Norvège, Danemark, Finlande et aux Etats-Unis. Peintre et sculpteur, Mendive également auteur de performances au cours desquelles il peint sur les corps nus de danseurs. L’art pluridisciplinaire de Mendive reflète sa vision syncrétique du monde, tant sur le plan religieux que philosophique et artistique.

  

 Manuel Mendive, "sin título"

 Cuban. Manuel Mendive

Manuel Mendive is the leading Afro-Cuban artist, and quite possibly the leading Cuban artist working today. (...) Manuel Mendive (...) is unquestionably a visionary artist, whose work is permeated with the spirits of Afro-Cuban religions which are such an influence on many of the artist s(...) Born to a family which practiced Santeria, he received a conventional art education at the Academy of San Alejandro. But in his mature work Mendive returned to his Afro-Cuban roots. As Veerle Poupeye writes, he"turned to popular culture as his formal and conceptual source." An initiate in Santeria and Palo Monte, he "practises what the Cuban critic Gerardo Mosquera has termed 'living mythological thought' and uses Afro-Cuban imagery to examine the questions of contemporary life." In describing his more recent work, Poupeye continues, "his travels to Africa in the early eighties gave new energy and depth to his work and he adopted a more informal idiom that expresses an animist, sexually suggestive vision of nature acted out by hybrid, amorphous figures..." Exhibitions - Mendive has exhibited at major museums around the world and is included in the leading collections of Cuban art.


Manuel Mendive, Yoruba, 1992  


Manuel Mendive

"Comprendre beaucoup de choses de mon identité" Par Lisday Martínez Saavedra 

Manuel Mendive: Nature, Spirit, and Man | A Kennedy Center Digital Stage Original




Manuel Mendive, The Offering, 1999  


Manuel Mendive, Babalu Ayé, 1967

Manuel Mendive, Untitled, 2013 

Manuel Mendive, El Vaso de Leche, Manuel Mendive, 2001

Manuel Mendive, La gallina amarilla, 2010

Amarillo, azul y blanco (1991)

"Amarillo, azul y blanco,"a video by Ramón García, documents a traveling, public performance art event created by renowned Cuban artist Manuel Mendive. Brightly-painted dancing bodies journey through Lenin Park (Havana), San Juan river (Matanzas) and Oasis Hotel (Varadero) in a performance of embodied syncretism, a dance of colors --"yellow, blue and white," the title of the piece-- echoing both the basic language of visual artists and the distinctive colors of Santería deities --the colors of Ochún, Yemayá and Changó. Mendive blends significant elements of Afro-Cuban culture, creating a personal universe intimately linked to his particular worldview, one that establishes organic connections between nature and religion, African ancestry and Caribbean everyday life, a symphony of syncretism that, like all of Mendive's art, reflects a life of commitment to African spiritual practices, a commitment that became more intense after his first visits to Africa in the early 1980s.

Manuel Mendive con su ballet "Perfomance" y la modelo Luz María, 1987

Manuel Mendive ,Untitled (Oshun), 1991

Manuel Mendive, Untitled, 1993


Manuel Mendive, Untitled, 2000

Manuel Mendive, Se alimenta mi cabeza, me alimento yo, 2001


Manuel Mendive Hoyos, Aguas turbias, 2011


Manuel Mendive,Luz de la esperanza, 2002


Manuel Mendive - Energia ancestral - 1986


Manuel Mendive, Serie Las Tinieblas (Series Darkness), 2010


Manuel Mendive,The Sons of Water, Talking to a Fish 2001