Actualités

Exposition : Figures de Malala Andrialavidrazana

Since 17 October 2024, the Palais de Tokyo in Paris has been hosting the Figures exhibition by visual artist Malala Andrialavidrazana. Born in Madagascar, she lives and works in Paris. AA had the honour of publishing one of her all-over works in our issue of Afriques. In Paris, her monumental, never-before-seen work can be seen until 5 January 2025.

© Antoine Tempé
Malala Andrialavidrazana is a visual artist who uses photography as her preferred medium, both on her own and to create collages. Now that her work has been exhibited all over the world – from the Rencontres de Bamako to the Art Institute of Chicago, via the biennales in Karachi and the PAC Milan – all that remains is the city in which she works: the Palais de Tokyo is the first public institution to exhibit her work.

Malala Andrialavidrazana’s Figures are displayed along the 60-metre wall surface of the Palais de Tokyo’s glass roof. This is an original work of digital photomontage, designed for the venue. This monumental work, both retrospective and new, is made up of geographical maps on which are placed a variety of ‘figures’ taken from stamps, banknotes, prints, advertisements and other iconographic sources selected by the artist.

Vue d’exposition © Aurélien Mole

Malala Andrialavidrazana’s Figures are displayed along the 60-metre wall surface of the Palais de Tokyo’s glass roof. This is an original work of digital photomontage, designed for the venue. This monumental work, both retrospective and new, is made up of geographical maps on which are placed a variety of ‘figures’ taken from stamps, banknotes, prints, advertisements and other iconographic sources selected by the artist.

Trained as an architect, Malala Andrialavidrazana also draws her inspiration from interdisciplinarity: architecture, anthropology, history, geography, etc. ‘Who is speaking? From what point of view?’ are the questions the artist wishes to pose through these clashes of historical and geographical archives dating from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries – aesthetically bringing the subjects of colonisation and capitalism into these colourful interstices. More specifically, Malala Andrialavidrazana uses collage to bring together contradictory realities and, in so doing, aims to question the dynamics of domination. Figures explores the notion of métissage and interculturality, challenging the collective Eurocentric imagination.

Malala Andrialavidrazana, Figures 1883, Reference Map for Business Men, 2019 © Malala Andrialavidrazana
Figures by Malala Andrialavidrazana, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France
Until 5 January 2025
For further information, visit www.palaisdetokyo.com

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