Cristiano Mangovo | Body: Instrument and File
ON VIEW
June 15 -July 13, 2023
RECEPTION
Thursday, June 15, 6-8pm
LOCATION
413 West Broadway
New York, NY
-
Cristiano Mangovo was born in 1982 in Cabinda, Angola, and earned his Degree in Fine Art from Ecole des Beaux Arts in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) with additional training in urban scenography and performance. Growing up as a minor refugee in the DRC and returning to Angola in 2009, from early on Mangovo was faced with fundamental questions arising directly from the turbulent Angolan society and the world in general. Representing a new generation of socially-focused artists in an awakening and increasingly self-conscious Africa, formed by a country still forging its own post and de-colonial identity after years of civil conflict, his multi-faceted work spans painting, sculptures, performance and design, working towards cogent social commentary with strong psychoanalytical elements.
Mangovo received early recognition for his work, mounting some 40 exhibitions and performances and earning his first post-graduate solo exhibition in 2013 by the Foundation Art and Culture in Luanda. In 2014, he was awarded the Mirella Antognoli Prize by the Italian Embassy and Alliance Française as well as the prestigious ENSA ARTE prize, which sent him into Cite Internationale des Arts residency resulting in a solo exhibition in Paris. He has exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions in Portugal, France, Italy, South-Africa, Zimbabwe, D.R. Congo, Belgium and the United States. He featured in the Angola Pavilion 2015 Seeds of Memory at Expo Milan, which won the Best Pavilion Prize as well as took part with an individual installation and performances in the international urban Infecting the City Festival in Cape Town in 2016 supported by the Swiss Foundation for Culture. The artist lives and works between Angola and Lisbon, Portugal.
Chase Contemporary is pleased to announce an upcoming solo exhibition with Angolan artist Cristiano Mangovo. The paintings in this exhibition, created during his residency with Chase Contemporary, explore the body as an instrument for creation and destruction, and a file (or archive) of lived experiences. Body: Instrument and File marks Mangovo’s first exhibition in New York and will open on June 15th, at 413 West Broadway, with an opening reception from 6-8pm.
This body of work connects disappearing rituals from Angola with scenes of nature and metropolitan life. Making a painting of disappearing Angolan traditions, like Tchikumbi, an ancestral rite of initiation and fertility, allows Mangovo to memorialize these traditions and pass them on to others. His visual story-telling functions as a method of cultural preservation, conveying the message that all cultures, though varied, should be approached on an equal level, with respect and harmony. In the work Piano Man and Marimba Man, Mangovo depicts two musicians. One plays the western piano, the other plays a traditional African marimba. The juxtaposition of the figures emphasizes their commonalities and creative harmony.
Mangovo intends to put on a performance at the opening of his exhibition. The performance, taking place in a six by six foot area in the gallery, emphasizes issues of race and equality. Using movement, material, and his own body, the artist challenges the legitimacy of the identities that separate us in the face of our shared humanity. In past performances, Mangovo has painted his body, manipulated large sculptures, attached clothespins to his face, contorted his body, and sat for hours between blasting speakers. He embraces discomfort in order to transmit a message, becoming, in the moment of performance, an object among objects.
For Mangovo, the body is a planet, vast, sometimes incomprehensible, and full of brutality and riches. It is at the core of all experience with a capacity for communication beyond language. The body chronicles all of the physical and emotional marks left on each of us throughout our lives. Everything that moves — human, animal, and organic forms —inspires him. When someone stands before his paintings, he wants them to see a living thing, something vibrant and energetic. In a large blue work 80 x 108 inches, an angel reaches down to earth with outstretched hands, beckoning for a better sense of understanding and harmony. Her wings are made up of scrolls, full of divine knowledge. The angel’s face, intentionally left unrendered, has no gender. This allows the angel to assume any - or no- identity. The people below twist their bodies with the effort of living, receiving grace, and earthly labor. Mangovo hopes to depict and inspire a better way of life through his work, a world more harmonious between people and nature.
Mangovo received early recognition for his work, mounting some 40 exhibitions and performances and earning his first post-graduate solo exhibition in 2013 by the Foundation Art and Culture in Luanda. In 2014, he was awarded the Mirella Antognoli Prize by the Italian Embassy and Alliance Française as well as the prestigious ENSA ARTE prize, which sent him into Cite Internationale des Arts residency resulting in a solo exhibition in Paris. He has exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions in Portugal, France, Italy, South-Africa, Zimbabwe, D.R. Congo, Belgium and the United States. He featured in the Angola Pavilion 2015 Seeds of Memory at Expo Milan, which won the Best Pavilion Prize as well as took part with an individual installation and performances in the international urban Infecting the City Festival in Cape Town in 2016 supported by the Swiss Foundation for Culture. The artist lives and works between Angola and Lisbon, Portugal.
