Rwanda-
In dedication to women, Rwandan Visual artist François Mucyo’s recent exhibition dubbed HER captures quite detailed aspects the artist finds special, crucial, yet go unnoticed by the public.
While his first solo exhibition dubbed Constellation, held in 2015 captured mostly nature’s creation yet the second themed Ali Bomaye, revolved around the legendary boxing champion Mohammed Ali’s memorable live acts-months before he passed on, his 2016-2017 invention captures the female human forms through expression,
“Women are literally the backbone to our country. It’s the inspiration of what they give us that I bring forth,” explains Mucyo.
HER is majorly a tribute to the artist’s mother, who he says has been a core source of inspiration till this day. The artist goes for the rarely un noticed side of the feminine side. With themes like Soul, passion, Rain, he depicts a soft approach of a woman through each portrait.
Eyes, a piece by Mucyo
In one of his pieces entitled Flame, the artist represents a woman as a source of light, power- from her hair, which symbolizes blazing flames. In another painting titled Pride, she ornaments herself to emulate how appreciative she awards herself.
Flame
What makes Mucyo stand out, from the rest of the visual artists is his authentic self-creation dubbed bleach Art, where his works are crafted as a result of using bleaching chemicals, but with unique skill he emerges with images- which appear from a dark canvas. This being his signature, Mucyo flexibly takes hold of this special art form, hence further expressing unique creations out of it.
The artist fairly conveys emotions without any diverse mixture of colors, but with toned bleached canvas, which he treats with immense skill. A great skill he quite holds in further treating his dark canvas, well relating it with his subject of focus. The portraits either emerge from the background, or vanish, sinking into it, which gets quite harder separating the two (background and the subject).
The artist believes how society should rather uphold women, as they contribute more to shaping the world through their natural character reflected through forgiveness, motherhood, family, determination, strength and other life aspects.
The 36-year-old artiste has since 2015 taken his art to public places; beginning with Inema Art Center in Kacyiru, Kigali, something he believes will help him share at a broader platform.
