Artists in residence

INTERVIEW

You were able to benefit from our residency program created in collaboration with the Foundation H, can you tell us a few words about it?

La Parenthèse, manomboka eto ny fahasambarana (here begins happiness).

It is a dream that has come true thanks to the dynamism of the Fondation H team and the warm welcome of the Cité internationale des arts.  

It was the first time I left Madagascar and it was a big change when I woke up the next day in the heart of Paris. The architecture, the museums, the cultural events, the metro, the people… everything impressed me. The magic of this incredible experience exceeds all my expectations. Traveling through art, with art, for art is a blessing for me.

The principle of the residency at the Cité allows for unexpected and exceptional encounters with artists from all over the world, whatever their discipline.

It is a privileged mode of support for artistic production in all its diversity, as well as for the professionalization of artists. The original work environment offered allows, thanks to the time thus freed up and the spaces and tools made available, a renewal of the forms of creation, production and transmission. Not to mention the team, attentive and very attentive, which seeks to put each resident at ease.

I am in the middle of developing my project La parenthèse, ici commence le bonheur, an ode to sensitivity, love and resilience. The impact of the first two weeks of residency is already reflected in my current creations: new colors or techniques or new mediums.

This breath of energy is a unique opportunity for me to grow on a personal level but also / especially in the construction of a professional career.

An anecdote about your residency at the Cité internationale des arts?

Being a bit shy by nature, I was afraid to show up at the welcome breakfast for new residents – so much so that I couldn’t sleep the night before. Fear of the unknown, of the language barrier, of approaching people, of not being up to it. Up to what? I don’t know.

The ice was broken as soon as I walked through the door of the Café des Arts where the meeting was held.

I still remember the warmth of the place. You don’t need words to understand why we were all there. One could feel through the looks and smiles the sincerity of the sharing, all these artists coming from various horizons gathered with the same passion for art, having dreams and ambitions.

The contact was made naturally. I realized how much pressure I was putting on myself about what I had to accomplish here. There is no obligation of result, all the interest of a residency lies in the process, the research and the development of oneself.

It’s an adventure that begins and you are dazzled by the magic of today and the surprise of tomorrow.

BIOGRAPHY

Richianny Ratovo is a visual artist from Madagascar. Fascinated by the history of each of her encounters, she seeks to materialize the essence of each subject by combining personal vision and research from contemporary creation. Through this medium, she develops a poetic language populated with images, reflecting a real or imaginary life scene.

She expresses herself mainly through painting, drawing and pyrography, but also through photography and poetry.

Haminiaina Ratovoarivony (Hamy Ratovo) is an independent Malagasy writer, director and producer. He graduated in sociology in Madagascar and then studied cinema in France. He is part of the new generation of Malagasy filmmakers who are fighting for the revival of cinema in his country. His first self-produced feature film Malagasy Mankany (a.k.a Legends of Madagascar), has received several awards in international festivals.

All of his films are born out of a sense of indignation: Malagasy Mankany (2012) highlights the widespread corruption in Madagascar, Antananarivo tiako ianao (2017) speaks of the impunity of the rulers, Razana (2018) evokes the homophobia of an ultra-conservative society.

Haminiaina Ratovoarivony is currently developing his second feature film, Nofy, which plunges into the heart of the beauty but also the evils of the rural Malagasy world.

Tovo has just arrived in the village on his motorcycle when he learns the sad news. Nofy, the doctor with whom he is secretly in love, but to whom he has never had the courage to declare his love, has been killed by bandits. As the only person with a car in the remote village, the mayor asks him to take Nofy’s body back to her parents in town. Tovo then begins a journey full of pitfalls and twists and turns. He will be accompanied by the ghost of Nofy to whom he will finally confess his love.

To this subject, Haminiaina Ratovoarivony says: Nofy is a story motivated by two words that were intertwined in my thoughts: ‘resilience’ and ‘indignation’. 

Ashiko Ratovo was born in 1998 in Antananarivo (Madagascar). A self-taught multidisciplinary artist, she is the winner of the 7th edition fo the Paritana Prize.

After passing her baccalauréat in 2017, she went on to study for a degree in social psychology at the University of Aix-Marseille. Alongside her studies, Ashiko Ratovo has been painting, first with watercolours, then with acrylics. Curious about the multiplicity of supports and mediums, she gradually integrated sculpture into her practice and took up embroidery. In 2022, she took the AINGA training course at the Fondation H – a programme designed to provide artists with a solid theoretical and practical foundation for their artistic careers. During the same period, Ashiko Ratovo created her own brand of 100% natural watercolours: Lokorano (watercolour in Malagasy). That same year, she entered the Bachelor of Fine Arts programme at Paris Panthéon Sorbonne. Her work was presented for the first time at her solo exhibition: Vohitrin’ny Nofy [Reliefs of Dreams] at Art’Home Ankadilalana Antananarivo in October 2022.
 

During her residency at the Cité internationale des arts, Ashiko developed her project Tsy manan-kialofana [Homeless]. That same year, the French Ministry of Culture awarded her the Prix Création Africa for her animation project, co-created with Madagascan director Dina Nomena Andriarimanjaka, runner-up in the 7th Prix Paritana.

Ashiko Ratovo experiments with a number of media, using a combination of watercolour and acrylic to depict abstract, organic landscapes that evoke the idea of a refuge or a home. A home in which the artist ambiguously projects both the desire to burrow and the desire to flee. Ashiko Ratovo’s research led to the creation of Halam’patana [Home], a group of four paintings depicting washing lines on which clothes are drying. The image of clothes being hung out to dry bears witness to the occupation of homes, and also marks the establishment of individuals within Malagasy society.

Textiles play a particularly important role in Madagascar, both in terms of the tradition of weaving and the actual use of textile products. The lamba, a traditional Malagasy woven item, accompanies people throughout their lives, from birth to death. It acts like a second skin, like protection, evoking for the artist once again the idea of refuge.

Over and above the representation of textiles in her paintings, Ashiko Ratovo is directly incorporating textile fibres into a new plastic research project: Hanafotra [Submerger]. This series is made up of several pieces whose metal wire structure echoes the iron wires used to hang washing, and is covered with a crumbly, fragile clay supported by a mass of wool and cotton threads.

ENTRETIEN

You are the recipient of the Prix Paritana, and benefit from the residency programme thought by the Cité internationale des arts and the Fondation H. Can you tell us a little more about your experience?

The Prix Paritana is the largest contemporary art prize dedicated to Malagasy artists, and I was selected as the recipient of the 7th edition of this prize. I then benefited from the residency program at the Cité Internationale des Arts. Finding myself in a creative space designed for artists enabled me to rediscover myself in my art, and the fact of having been “cut off from the world” by deliberately isolating myself in the studio pushed me to my limits, which opened new doors in my creation. The residency gave me the opportunity to bring my project to fruition and, at the same time, to embark on the development of my art. My practice is quite young, but my desire to create has always been present.

Why choose painting as your main means of artistic expression?

I’m a “jack of all trades” artist I do a lot of textile art and sculpture with various materials, but painting seemed an obvious choice when I was researching. I didn’t choose it, it came to me. Halfway through my residency, I was no longer able to create, and my only escape was to produce my watercolors, which I grind by hand, as a way of staying “productive”. By accident, I dropped my mortar full of color on a canvas, and as it dried, the pigments adhered to it. I was so taken with the effects that watercolor combined with acrylic, already on canvas, that I decided to make a series of them for my exhibition.

What projects did you develop during this residency? Can you tell us a little more about your future projects?

My project is entitled “Tsy Manan-kialofana” or homelessness in Malagasy. My artistic approach is to work on human conditions, and in each of my artistic projects I add a touch of autobiography, as I like to transcribe a part of myself in my work, which allows me to remain authentic and discuss with the viewer without having to utter a word.  

The next part of the exhibition, which took place at the Fondation H Paris, will be held at the Institut Français de Madagascar in March 2024. This second part will be the final culmination of my project, which I hope will evolve over time. 
In parallel, I have an animation project entitled “La fabrique des filles” (“The girls’ factory”) with director Dina Nomena, which we intend to develop and launch as an itinerant screening campaign throughout the island of Madagascar, in order to raise awareness among as many people as possible of the burden society places on women’s education.

Sabrina Ratté is an artist of Canadian nationality and Quebec identity living in Paris. Her practice focuses on the multiple manifestations of the digital image: analog video, 3D animation, photography, printing, sculpture, virtual reality and installation.

The continual integration of new techniques formally supports the themes that run through her work, such as the psychological influence of architecture and the digital environment on our perception of the world and our relationship with the virtual aspect of existence.

She has been nominated for the Sobey Art Award in 2019 and 2020. Her work has been presented internationally by several institutions including the Laforet Museum (Tokyo), the Musée National des Beaux-arts du Québec (Quebec), Thoma Foundation (Santa Fe), the IHP Center (Montreal), Whitney Museum of Art (New York), Chronus Art Center, (Shanghai), Museum of the Moving Image (New York). She is represented by Galerie Ellephant in Montreal and Galerie Charlot in Paris.