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Amouzou Glikpa was born in 1960 in Sokodé, Togo and began his professional career in Lomé, where he studied German Language and Literature. In 1983, he moved to China, where he spent a decade – with a few intermittent breaks – studying at Beijing’s Central Academy of Fine Arts as Professor Sheng Yang’s master pupil. He has been living in Germany for the past 14 years, eight of them as assistant to Professor Tony Cragg, under whom he studied in Dusseldorf from 1992 to 1995.
We are currently exhibiting a collection of sculptures, drawings, and paintings from 2008 and 2009 that the artist prepared for our gallery. Amongst them is the well-known work Le Fa, a wagon with oversized cowries through which Glikpa reminiscences about his early years.
Glikpa has been heavily influenced by both the religion and the traditional art of Togo; its myths and legends often serve as themes in the artist’s works, expressed through the lens of a fascination with Chinese and European history. Thus oversized shoes with built-in speakers recount West African proverbs, large images refer to traditional voodoo symbolism, and drawings are a study in rhythms.
Particularly impressive is an installation of 16 ram heads arranged in a spiral and accompanied by numerous individually-hanging heads; the ram, in many religions, serves as mythological animal of sacrifice and battle. Two sculptures of clay, Styrofoam, and metal complete the exhibition.
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