Since 2016 Jean Katambayi Mukendi has been producing the Afrolampes series, large ballpoint pen drawings featuring a stylized light bulb whose elements have taken myriad fantasmagorical shapes. The strict geometric forms of the afrolampes serve both as a medium for the artist’s meditations and as commentaries, sometimes critical, on our modern world.
The series took a new direction when the Covid19 pandemic struck. The artist, unable to travel, focused instead on drawings that he baptized “Covid afrolampes” and sent to events where he had been invited, as his de facto spokespersons. The work in the collection was shown at the 2020 Busan Biennale, one of the very few that took place in person at the height of the pandemic. Other works from the series were shown at the aptly named Quarantaine show with Ramiken, Mukendi’s first solo show (in absentia) in the US.
