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The Contemporary African Art Collection (CAAC) is a private collection created by Italian business man, Jean Pigozzi, over the last 20 years. It includes several thousand artworks featuring paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs, installations and videos from contemporary artists living in sub-Saharan African countries. Curated up to 2008 by André Magnin, now an independant curator and art dealer, the CAAC is regularly acquiring new pieces, adding new artists and lending works to major art institutions and museums around the world.
The collection is based in Geneva, and does not have a permanent exhibition venue. In 2008, Jean Pigozzi also started collecting contemporary Japanese art, the collection is presented on japigozzicollection.com. |
| CURRENT EXHIBITIONS |
| The Alternative Guide to the Universe, Hayward Gallery June 11 2013 to August 26 2013 The CAAC is contributing works by Bodys Isek Kingelez to the Hayward Gallery's exhibition "The Alternative Guide to the Universe". This exhibition surveys the work of individuals who create alternatives in art, science and architecture. The exhibition is focused on self-taught practitioners whose work is generally produced outside of established channels and official institutions. The Alternative Guide to the Universe features a range of contributors from fringe physicists to the inventors of new languages, from artists who map cities of the future to others who design imaginary technologies. Inspiringly original and bracingly eccentric, their work re-imagines our social and cultural conventions in ways that fearlessly depart from accepted ways of thinking. Taken together, it conjures a kind of a parallel universe where ingenuity and inventiveness trump common sense and received wisdom. |
| Johnny's Diary, Galerie du jour - agnès b. June 08 2013 to July 20 2013 Jean Pigozzi reveals part of his most personal collection at an exhibition at the Galerie du jour - agnès b. in Paris. A selection of a hundred or so images from the gallery's photographic logbook will be on display. |
| The 55th Venice Biennale 2013 June 01 2013 to November 24 2013 A selection of Frédéric Bruly Bouabré's works fom the CAAC will be displayed in the Arsenale in this year's Biennale in Venice, Italy. Bouabré's drawings can also be seen at the Ivory Coast Pavilion which is participating in the Biennale for the frist time this year. Also in the Arsenale, a large display of J.D. 'Okhai OJEIKERE's photographs. The 55th International Art Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia is under the artistic direction of Massimiliano Gioni and is entitled Il Palazzo Enciclopedico / The Encyclopedic Palace. The exhibition will place at its heart "a reflection on the ways in which images have been used to organize knowledge and shape our experience of the world." Inspired by what scholar Hans Belting has called "an anthropology of images", the Biennale Arte 2013 will attempt "an inquiry into the realms of the imaginary and the functions of imagination." |
| Signs in the leaves, Barthélémy Toguo, Médoathèque Benjamin-Rabier, La Roche-sur-Yon May 30 2013 to August 31 2013 The exhibition "Signs in the Leaves" at the Médiathèque Benjamin-Rabier is devoted to the works of CAAC artist Barthélémy Toguo. "Signs in the leaves presents a set of pieces showing the diversity of his work: prints, sculptures, photographs and watercolors ... Using recycled materials, he creates a space that comes close to that of a theater stage. His favorite themes are exile, displacement and travel..." |
| Kudzanai Chiurai, Front Page, Mallorca Landings, Mallorca, Spain May 24 2013 to July 28 2013 "In a similar style to previous bodies of work (such as his Dying to be Men series of 2009), Chiurai’s constructed environments are enticing and seductive but explore very real casualties of African independence and democracy and the effects of globalisation on war. Chiurai’s nation asks, “If we could write our history and chart our futures as we please, who would we be?”... |
| Signs in the leaves, Barthélémy Toguo, Médoathèque Benjamin-Rabier, La Roche-sur-Yon May 23 2013 to August 31 2013 The exhibition "Signs in the Leaves" at the Médiathèque Benjamin-Rabier is devoted to the works of CAAC artist Barthélémy Toguo. "Signs in the leaves presents a set of pieces showing the diversity of his work: prints, sculptures, photographs and watercolors ... Using recycled materials, he creates a space that comes close to that of a theater stage. His favorite themes are exile, displacement and travel..." |
| Cheveux Chéris, Quai Branley, Paris September 18 2012 to July 14 2013 Hairstyle photographs from CAAC artist J.D. Okhai Ojeikere will be part of The Quai Branley Museum exhibition dedicated to hair. Cheveux Chéris brings together anthropology, the history of ancient and contemporary art, fashion and customs. |
| The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gallery 351- Ethiopia September 01 2012 to September 30 2013 Works of Ethiopian artist Gedewon from the Pigozzi collection are on display in the Met's Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas permanent collection. The works can be found in Gallery 351 until September 2013. "This gallery presents an array of forms of expression that developed following the adoption of Christianity as a state religion by the emperor of Aksum, Ezana, in the fourth century." Along with his religious studies, Gedewon was secretly initiated into talismanic art. The purpose of his art was to heal body and soul through ancient patterns, imagery, and invocation. |
Caacart 2008
The Jean Pigozzi Collection - June 18 2013 Contact Caacart