Yacob Bizuneh Negera

Yacob Bizuneh Negera
B. 1983

Yacob Bizuneh Negera was born in 1983 in Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia. After studying technical drawing he enrolled in the University of Addis Ababa’s Alle School of Fine Arts and Design, graduating with a degree in painting (BFA) in 2013. He taught there until his departure for France in 2017.
From the time of his earliest personal work, Yacob Bizouneh has continued to explore social, economic and political developments, and their consequences for human well-being in the countries he has visited. At the large market in Addis Ababa he developed a series of paintings, assemblages and performances on the theme of the recycling of oil drums and the alienation of scrap metal workers, who are caught in an infernal and deadening cycle: Circle and Hollow, 2013. In the 2015 public performance Under Construction, a businessman wearing a suit and tie and holding an attaché case covered the artist with yellow and green paint, like the construction site barriers that indicate the mass expulsion of the inhabitants of neighbourhoods slated to disappear due to real estate speculation.
During a stay in Seoul in 2015, Yacob Bizuneh discovered the people he calls Moving Shadows (Ombres mouvantes). People who move around the city with their eyes glued to their tablets and smartphones, disconnected from the space and time that link people, unaware of themselves and others. Going from a “we” society to a continually evolving “I” society, Yacob Bizouneh translates this culture shock into a visual object. Whether through painting, sculpture, or video installations, in Subway Shadows, 2015 and Still Shadows, 2019, he tries to capture the destinies of these dark silhouettes that are completely absorbed by their mirror-like tablets: the absent presences that haunt the metros of Seoul and Paris.