Afro Futuro: The Soul of Nature

ILIDIO CANDJA CANDJA In his paintings, Mozambican - bor n ar tist Ilidio Candja Candja draws the audience into a personal exploration of his play ful and dynamic energy.

E xecuted in a st yle resonant with Abstract E xpressionism and Action Painting, his wor k s are character ized by spontaneous and confident br ush strokes. Inspi red by his her itage, the r iot of colors, personal symbols and Afr ican textile pr ints all ser ve to infuse his canvases with both a psychological and visual vibrancy.

These painted collages by Candja are a compelling combination of cultural reflection and personal symbology. From abstracted backg rounds ar ise restless figures that belong to the ar tist’s own constr ucted my thology.

Impulsive and agg ressive gestures that reference Action Painting come together to create blur red ghosts, demonic entities, arachnids, and skeletons.

An enigmatic tension ar ises in the wor k with the layer ing of more subtle geometr ical and mathematical objects, photog raphs, and decorative elements taken from traditional Afr ican ar t and textiles. Candja Candja’s ar t is a contemplation on the Afr ican culture combined with a pursuit of explor ing his own restless spi r it.

ILIDIO CANDJA CANDJA

“Painting after painting, Candja Candja asserts his extraordinary creative freedom and produces a work of internal otherness to the art world without demagoguery or naïveté, influenced by what might have been his artistic training in the colourful tradition of his country.”

- Victor Pinto

PHOENIX Acrylic, Collage and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

TROPICAL CEREMONY NO. 2, 2014 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 79 x 71 Inches

AFRICA F UTURO Many artists take years to carefully create their identity as painters; but Illídio Candja Candja merely followed his inspiration as painter, indifferent to associations and references to other contemporary artists, never forgetting his African origin.

Candja Candja is like a manufacturer who believes that his products will always be special for themselves. Painting after painting, he asserts his extraordinary creative freedom and produces a work of internal otherness to the art world without demagoguery or naïveté, influenced by what might have been his artistic training in the colourful tradition of his country.

TATUAGENS ANCESTRAIS, 2015 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

Ilídio’s painting isn’t about creating a critical position, but instead is an artistic, aesthetics and cultural practice analogous to those who are guided by a free behaviour, starting from the premise that art invents ways of inhabiting the world.

The artist proposes us to inhabit his world, sending us an effective message of things that he is sensitive to, including those that concern him from a remix of thoughts and ideas of the past, present and future. The African experience of Ilídio Candja became several experiments determinative to the structure of his paintings: flickering between image and idea, identity and experience.

Colourful and exotic, the paintings of Candja convert themselves into infinite imaginary manners, an intelligent coexistence between images of African culture and painting-collage’s

abstract

backgrounds

on

which

the images are introduced and the African memory is activated.

AFRICO FUTURO SEM FIM, 2015 Acrylic, Tapestry and Mixed Media on Canvas 79 x 71 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 1, 2016 Acrylic, Tapestry and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

Two years after moving from Maputo (Mozambique, where he was born) to live in Porto(Portugal), the painting of Ilídio Candja has attracted the attention of many international experts.

The first point to emphasize in the painting of Illídio Candja, is the way he is able to produce a universal painting; the universalism of his vision lies in how he uses images of handmade objects and ancient artefacts from the artist’s African imaginary, and the manner how he converts them into essential, unique elements in his painting, making use of collage in a modern context in a way that it becomes impossible to separate the collage-paintings of the artist’s path.

MAPIKU MAKOSSA, 2013 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 55 x 59 Inches

MENTES BRILHANTES, 2016 Acrylic, Collage and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

PHATA PHATA, 2015 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

UNTITLED 2 (CHIGUBU), 2016 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 59 x 55 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 4, 2014 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 47 x 43 Inches

AFRICA NÃO E BANANA 2, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 79 x 79 Inches

MEMÓRIAS E FANTASIAS 1, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

YOGA 1, 2018 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 79 x 79 Inches

OLHANDO PARA O PASSASO, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 39 x 26 Inches

GREENER FUTURE 2, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 79 Inches

THE SOUL OF NATURE, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

UNTITLED, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

KEEPING THE SOUL, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

KING WA MARRABENTA, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

UNTITLED, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 79 x 79 Inches

MACUTA 2, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 85 x 79 Inches

BRASAO 2, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

ISIS, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

MAPIKO, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 59 x 55 Inches

TROPICALIA, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

TROPICALIA GREENER FUTURE, 2020 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 71 x 67 Inches

UNTITLED, 2016 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 28 x 28 Inches

UNTITLED, 2016 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 28 x 28 Inches

UNTITLED, 2019 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 48 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Canvas 59 x 55 Inches

WORKS ON PAPER

UNTITLED, 2019 Mixed Media on Paper, 39 x 30 Inches

COMPOSITION, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 47 x 60 Inches

DNA #5, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 43 x 60 Inches

DNA #6, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 42 x 59 Inches

DNA #7, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 36 x 60 Inches

DNA #8, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 36 x 60 Inches

DNA #9, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 36 x 60 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 2, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 40 x 77 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 1, 2016, Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 39 x 78 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 7, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 8, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 6, 2017 | Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 5, 2017 | Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 4, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

UNTITLED NO. 3, 2017 Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 59 x 30 Inches

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