Draft:Gastineau Massamba

Gastineau Massamba is a painter.. , sculptor and poet born in 1973 in Poto-Poto in Brazzaville in the Republic of Congo.

Biography
Gastineau Massamba was introduced to art at a very young age by his father. After studying letters and literature, he continued his studies in Arts at the Tsiemé School of Arts in Talangaïvit (in the workshop of Remy Mongo-Etsion). His youth was first marked by the events of 1997 then by the civil war which would have a lasting impact on his work.

In 2002, he exhibited bronze sculptures at the Ciciba Biennial (International Center of Bantu Civilization) in Brazzaville. Always modern bronzes at the town hall of Brazzaville in 2003, then terracotta works at the Dakar Biennale in 2004. In 2006 he presented contemporary iron sculptures at the French Cultural Center of Brazzaville, then bronzes made during a first residency at the Contemporary Art Center Fondation Jean-Paul Blachère in Apt. In 2007 several exhibitions presented his paintings in Belgium as well as at the DUTA Biennale, in Douala, Cameroon. Between 2008 and 2012 he multiplied exhibitions between Paris, Spain, Bilbao, Morocco and Congo. In 2011 he participated in the exhibition “Expériences Africa” at the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren .Gastineau Massamba left his country on July 7, 2012 and settled in France. In 2012 he presented “Crossed African Perspectives” during the International Biennial of Contemporary Art in Casablanca, within the walls of the Attijariwafa Bank Foundation. Followed in 2013 by “Contemporary African Perspectives”, still at the Attijariwafa Bank Foundation in Casablanca.

On July 7, 2016, France refused to regularize his papers even though his works were listed internationally and he had been paying his taxes in France for several years. That year he exhibited in London, in Paris at the AKAA6 show with Galerie K0217 , in New York during the AMREFArt Ball then at Espace Talan in Tunis with Galerie Aicha Gorgi. He left sculpture and painting aside to begin creating large embroideries which enjoyed international success.

In 2017 he is offering no less than 11 exhibitions, at the Palais des Papes in Avignon with “Les Eclaireurs, Fondation Blachère”, in Morocco at the GVCCCasablanca, in Cameroon with “New war it’s just a game? », which follows a residency at Bandjoun Station, the art center of his friend Barthélémy Toguo, at the Contemporary Art Center in Essaouira in Morocco, at the Donwahi Foundation in Abidjan in Ivory Coast, at the Museum of IFAN in Dakar in Senegal, at the United Nations Palace in Geneva in Switzerland, in Paris AKKA, Galerie AAB Paris, and finally Guadeloupe still with Bandjoun Station for the Pool Art Fair.

In the following years he continued to exhibit his embroideries between Europe and Africa until 2020 when he stopped using fabrics to start painting black bodies on a black background, a work that he presented at the Anne de Villepoix gallery in Paris then at the Kunsthalle Krems in Austria

Artwork
Gastineau Massamba is an artist who renews himself regularly. Initially a sculptor, he moved from terracotta to bronze then to welding of recovered metals, before starting to paint and then weave very large formats which can reach a size of twenty meters. He also had a whole period of installations and performances before returning to painting black bodies on black background