Aimé Ntakiyica (1960, Burundi, lives and works in Beersel, Belgium) studied painting and drawing at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Brussels. He taught at the school of Fine arts Kinshasa in 1986, for one year.
Aimé likes to play with the concepts of ubiquity in his work, with the overlapping of spaces, literally and metaphorically. He marks his trajectory on identity, on thematic itineraries, such as “la palabre”, (the art of story telling), “le monde est ma maison” (the world is my home), “l’arbre généalogique” (the genealogical tree)... the markings operating as references rather than destinations. More generally, Aimé Ntakiyica plays with the collapse of identity, through these normative, irrational and at times ridiculous perceptions, in a mode of parody.
The medium is according to the purpose. Aimé stages himself in identity costumes, appropriates iconic images, merges into installations, imposes speech in his performances, searches for colors among the formatted and functional color... One can find him installing paper planes in a tree in Antwerp, cutting a cake in Budapest, offering posters in Johannesburg, displayed in Tokyo, installing a video tape-corridor in Sydney, playing Basketball in San Francisco, placing a school classroom in the middle of a forest, presenting jam jars in Dakar…
Aimé’s work called « Wir » is a critique on the dualisms that constitute the western tradition which has tended to, at all times, dominate whatever was different, or other, and he uses it to reflect his own image.
The Work of Ntakiyica was shown in many location such as: New Museum, New-York; Mori Art Museum, Tokyo; Beaubourg, Paris; Kunsthalle Bern, Switzerland; SMAK, Ghent; M HKA, Antwerp; Hayward Gallery, London; Bozar, Brussels; NSW art Gallery, Sydney; Musea Da Republica, Rio de Janiero; Kunstpalast Düsseldorf, Germany; Dakar, Senegal; Johannesburg art Gallery, Johannesburg; Palau de la Vireina, Barcelona; Moderna Museet, Stockholm…
Aimé gives lectures on his work at KASK, St Lucas, Ecole des arts décoratifs Strasbourg, and operates as a jury member at La Cambre, ARBA Brussels.