The 60th Venice Biennale, entitled “Foreigners everywhere”, designed by Brazilian curator Adriano Pedrosa, raises public awareness of the richness of multiculturalism. The Krystel Ann Art gallery, which promotes a number of artists, particularly from the French Antilles, continues its work with the Panamanian Afro-descendant, Giana De Dier.
The Venice Art Biennale, a multinational event, is at the same time a cultural, political and economic meeting. This event is marked today not only by the presence of Julien Creuzet, artist of Martinican origin at the France 2024 pavilion, and also for the first time, of a visual artist Afro-Panamanian, Giana De Dier supported by the international West Indian gallery Krystel Ann’ Art.
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©Private collection
The presence of this Afro-descendant, like that of Martinican Julien Crozet, is a recognition of the existence of a Franco-Caribbean aesthetic and discourse.
We are proud to see Panama, presented for the first time in an official pavilion at the Biennale. Among the artists, we find Afro-Panamanian Giana De Dier, whose speech focuses on the migrations of Caribbean men and women who were the main workforce for the construction of one of the most famous works of architecture in the world: the Panama Canal. For the Krystel Ann Art gallery, which has represented the artist since 2021, it is recognition of a sustained international career.
Chrystelle Mérabli, gallery director Krystel Ann Art
Since 2016, Olivier Tharsis and Chrystelle Merabli have aimed to give visibility to overseas and Afro-descendant artists on the international contemporary art scene.
This ambitious project is of course not without difficulties. It requires challenge and unfailing perseverance.
In 2019, Krystel Ann Art presents for the first time 3 Guadeloupean artists selected by curator Marci Gaymu: Joël Nankin, François Piquet and Jean-Marc Hunt during the 58th Venice Art Biennale. Each artist presented a new project from May 11 to November 24, 2019 in the gardens of Palazzo Mora.
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©philippe triay
This meeting called “Pavilion of the Islands of Guadeloupe” was supported by the institutions of the island and the Ministry of Culture.
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©Daniel BETIS
2021, Krystel Ann Art presents an overseas artist at the Venice Architecture Biennale. The Martinican, Christophe Mert, presents with the support of Martinican and national institutions, a giant sculpture “Ecological Totem”.
My creation is shared between reflection, research, expression. Martinique in all its diversity is my primary Source of inspiration. It was by discovering his story, by seeing myself as I am, that I was able to open my creation to the outside world. Through painting, I want to communicate with elsewhere while privileging my Martinican origins. Because this country, through its complex journey, offers me cultural wealth.
Christophe Mert, Martinique visual artist
Looking for visual artists unafraid to delve into history, the gallery found Giana De Dier, who mixes ancient and modern artifacts and symbolic images.
His impressive work is a fresh take “decolonialized” history, because migrations, forced or chosen, have the beauty of creating the emergence of new multicultural communities.
The Krystel Ann Art Gallery supports the need to establish a dialogue between French-speaking people in the Americas and other nations. Indeed, the Venice Biennale, considered the oldest and most political biennial in the world, is the event that brings prestige and international recognition to artists, aesthetics and currents of thought in contemporary art. . It is also the ideal place for meetings and exchanges to build diversity and inclusion of island territories and minorities who are often victims of climate change and social injustice.
Olivier Tharsis, co-director of the gallery
The gallery wishes to perpetuate this diversity of identity in Venice through the creation of a pavilion for Ultramarines and the French-speaking world, a project carried out since 2016 by the two founders, Chrystelle Mérabli and Olivier Tharsis.
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