Born - 1977. Paris, France

Based in - Brooklyn, New York 

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Delphine Diallo is a Brooklyn-based French and Senegalese visual artist and photographer. 

 

She graduated from the Académie Charpentier School of Visual Art in Paris in 1999 before working in the music industry for seven years as a special effect motion artist, video editor and graphic designer. In 2008, she moved to New York to explore her own practice after giving up a cooperate Art Director role in Paris. Diallo was mentored by acclaimed photographer and artist of Peter Beard who was impressed by her creativity and spontaneity before offering her to collaborate for the Pirelli calendar photo shoot in Botswana. Inspired by new environments on this trip, she decided to return to her father's home city of Saint-Louis in Senegal to start her own vision quest.

Sought to challenge the norms of our society, Diallo immerses herself in the realm of anthropology, mythology, religion, science and martial arts to release her mind. Her work takes her to far remote areas, as she insists on spending intimate time with her subjects to better able represent their most innate energy “I treat my process as if it were an adventure liberating a new protagonist” — Diallo’s powerful portraitures unmask and stir an uninhibited insight that allows her audience to see beyond the facade. “We are in constant search for wonder and growth. I see art asa vessel to express consciousness and an access to diffuse wisdom, enlightenment, fear, beauty, ugliness, mystery, faith, strength, fearless, universal matter”.

Where ever she can, Diallo combines artistry with activism, pushing the many possibilities of empowering women, youth, and cultural minorities through visual provocation. Diallo uses analog, digital photography and collages  as she continues to explore new mediums. She is working towards creating new dimensions and a place where consciousness and art are a universal language by connecting artists, sharing ideas and learning.

"My intention is to change the gaze in photography, create a new narrative to empower black women and create new experiences for consciousness to expand. Women are in need for different kinds of narrative. The woman's body should be one of the most respectable places on earth. Without her, we will not be born, nor either feeling unconditional love. So many black women who have been abused, disrespected, betrayed understand the power of healing because they had no other choice to carry on with life. For centuries, the Patriarchal society transformed the black woman body as an object. i want to bring a great new vision of black female archetypes: the explorer, the queen, the goddess, the innocent, the sage, the mother, the caregiver, the ruler, the lover, the spiritual warrior, the magician, the everywoman, so many others. It is the birth of the divine feminine within me (and within all of us ) that comes through our families and ancestors, an energy which was once oppressed."

 

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Text: Courtesy of Delphine Diallo website

Photo of artwork: Courtesy of Fisheye Gallery 

Portrait: Delphine Diallo ©

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