Ousmane Mbaye

For its first participation at Design Miami Basel, Foreign Agent will present "Bolibana", from acclaimed designer from Burkina Faso, Hamed Ouattara, whose work was recently acquired by the Denver Museum of Art. Born in 1971 in Ouagadougou, the industrial design graduate from Paris is known for his meticulous artisanal prowess; utilizing collected scraps, debris, industrial waste – in particular oil barrels as his raw material. Hamed Ouattara named his latest series BOLIBANA which in the Bamana language of Mali and Burkina Faso means “the happy ending of an unusual journey” a tribute to the entirety of his body of work since his beginnings. His productions are entirely handmade, using ancestral welding techniques. The result is a bold series of original and functional sculptures, a daring combination of architectural elegance and playful animality.

In addition to Hamed Ouattara’s work, Foreign Agent will also present a unique piece from renowned Mozambican artist and designer Gonçalo Mabunda. “Big Chair” is composed of decommissioned weapons from the Mozambican civil war. Mabunda’s work has been acquired by the Chazen Museum of Art, Minneapolis Institute of Art and the Brooklyn Museum.

Finally, Foreign Agent will present chairs by Ousmane Mbaye Design from his new Plus collection made in Dakar.

For its first participation at PAD Paris, Foreign Agent will present a selection of works by some of the leading designers and artists rom Africa and the Diaspora, such as...

Foreign Agent is excited to introduce Play/Mobile, a curated show presenting a body of photographs by Jamal Nxedlana which evoke a relationship with and to sculpture, putting the ubiquitous monobloc plastic chairs at the centre. These cheap, flexible productions index the repetition, replication and duplication processes that “drain culture, objects and life of their idiosyncrasy, their spark and potential. [Becoming] copies and copies of copies” (Jamal Nxedlana). The flexibility and fluidity of the plastic is further mirrored by the actors’ bodies, a celebration of the formless, which as the French philosopher Georges Bataille argued, was to bring “art down in the world”, down from its elevated status to its base materialism, as a vector for creativity.

This playful critique of the generic is set in dialogue with new productions in contemporary design from Africa and the Diaspora: selected pieces from Dokter and Misses’ new line of work Sketches from the Edge, as well as their Blue Chair, which is also referenced in one of Nxedlana’s work; the Yayoi chairs designed by Bibi Seck for Foreign Agent, recently featured in Elle Déco and his recycled plastic Taboo line; Jomo Tariku’s stools which appear in the forthcoming Black Panther movie series and iconic Nyala chair and Ousmane Mbaye’s new afrofuturistic Plus line. All presented for the first time in Switzerland.

Foreign Agent will also launch selected items from Ohiri Studio OUTLINES as featured in Vogue and worn by Bella Hadid at the Met Gala. Exclusively at Foreign Agent.

The show opens Saturday December 10 in presence of Jamal Nxedlana.

Foreign Agent is thrilled to present for the first time at AKAA Paris, Booth C7, presenting new and recent works by Maliza Kiasuwa, Ousmane Bâ, Bibi Seck, Ousmane Mbaye and...

Foreign Agent is excited to take part in Bonne Arrivée, the first contemporary African design exhibition at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, organized by the Les Oiseaux Migrateurs...

Inaugural Group Show of Foreign Agent gallery.