The Jean Pigozzi African Art Collection
Deux amies - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
La petite soeur qui plaire (sic) - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Les Catheurs de Kintambo (sic) - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Given to MoMA in 2019
Petit Londa et son ami L Groupe Odeon (sic) - 1974
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Given to MoMA in 2019
Petit Willy - 1978
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Photo passe-ports - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1977
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1978
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1977
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1976
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1977
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1976
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1974
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Untitled - 1978
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Vijo et Salou - 1975
60 x 50 cm
Gelatin Silver Print / Tirage argentique
Ambroise Ngaimoko (Studio 3Z)
Born in 1949, Angola.
Lives in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo.
In 1961, Ngaimoko moved with his family to Kinshasa. There he worked as a mechanic, then as a technician for an open-air cinema, before he became an assistant to his uncle Marques Ndodão in 1968, who ran two photo studios, and who gave him a Yashica 6x6 camera.
It was in Kitambo in 1971 that he opened the Studio 3Z, a named picked to symbolise the three Zaïres: the country, the currency and the river. Young people who came to the studio remember it because of the constantly changing backdrops.
He gained recognition in the course of the 1970s due to an unprecedented technique, in which he developed two portraits on the same sheet, using the same negative twice.
This cult of cloning is reminiscent of the rites performed for a lost twin.
In the full swing of "Zaïrization" there was a shortage of 6x6 black & white film and, with the eventual arrival of color film, Ngaimoko lost his clientele.
He resigned himself to using the format 24x36 to make his identity-based work.
In 1997, he renamed his studio 3C (for the three Congos).
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2021
HERITAGE
Carte Blanche à Omar Victor Diop, Galerie Magnin-A, Paris, France
2018
1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair, New York, USA
2017
Histoires congolaises, bibliothèque Robert-Desnos, Montreuil, France
Studio Africa!, Galerie Tristan Hoare, London, UK
2016
Paris Photo, Grand Palais, Paris, France
2015
Beauté Congo – 1926-2015 – Congo Kitoko, Fondation Cartier, Paris, France
2014
Luminós/C/ity.Ordinary Joy: From the Pigozzi Contemporary African Art Collection, Ethelbert Cooper Gallery of African & African American Art, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
2012
30th Bienal de São Paulo, Pavilion Ciccillo Matarazzo, Brazil
2011
JapanCongo
Magasin Grenoble, France
2011
Paris Photo, Place of Honour for Africa, Grand Palais, Paris
2010
A Useful Dream : African Photography 1960-2010, Palais des Beaux-Arts/Bozar, Brussels
2003
Africa Negra, Fotoseptiembre, Galeria Lópes Quiroga, Mexico
