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Gleaning the raw material of her work from the internet and books on natural sciences, Ntjam uses assemblage – of images, words, sounds, and stories – as a method to deconstruct the grand narratives underlying hegemonic discourses on origin, identity and race. Her work weaves multiple narratives drawn from investigations into historical events, scientific functions, or philosophical concepts, to which she confronts references to African mythology, ancestral rituals, religious symbolism and science-fiction. These apparently heterogeneous discourses and iconographies are marshaled together in an effort to re-appropriate History while speculating on not-yet-determined space-times – interstitial worlds where systems of perception and naming of fixed (id)entities no longer operate. From there, Ntjam composes utopian cartographies and ontological fictions in which technological fantasy, intergalactic voyages and hypothetical underwater civilizations become the matrix for a practice of emancipation that promotes the emergence of inclusive, processual and resilient communities.

Ntjam (b.1992, France) recently exhibited at CAC La Traverse, Alfortville; NıCOLETTı, Londres; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Hordaland Art Center, Bergen; Mucem, Marseille; MuCAT, Abidjan; Fondation Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon; AfricaMUSEUM, Tervuren; Frac Nouvelle-Aquitaine MÉCA, Bordeaux; Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Centre Pompidou, Paris; WIELS, Brussels; MAMA, Rotterdam; Biennale de Lyon, MAC Lyon; Arnolfini, Bristol.

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In January, AlUla Artist Residency welcomed Manon Wertenbroek, who lives and works in Paris and Zürich. Her sculptures, installations and photographs are almost always about the body, but without explicitly depicting it. Wertenbroek is interested in psychoanalysis, desire, and identity. With her work, she investigates the concept of skin as a membrane between the interior and exterior world. Her works have been presented in exhibitions at Muzeum Susch, Centre Culturel Suisse Paris, Istituto Svizzero in Rome and Milan, Coalmine Winterthur, Foam Amsterdam, Le Centre d’Art Contemporain Geneva, and Last Tango Zürich, among others. In 2017, Wertenbroek was awarded a Swiss Art Award by the Federal Office of Culture. In 2018 she was granted a year-long residency at the Swiss Institute in Rome.

Since arriving in AlUla, Manon Wertenbroek quickly grew an interest in its tafoni, cavities formed by wind corrosion in the most fragile parts of rocks and mountainsides. Observing their organic shapes, textures, and tints, she imagined the mountains as giant bodies that could be walkedthrough. With the very particular way she detects an organic, carnal, and possibly living dimension in the most varied objects, Manon Wertenbroek also walked through AlUla’s city center and examined the specific ornaments of the area to inform her own artwork.

Specialising in installation, scultpure, and photography, Manon Wertenbroek’s work explores the human condition and the physiological effects of interacting with one another and the world around us. Wertenbroek has been inspired by the contours of AlUla’s landscape and draws a comparison to those of human skin. Her work focuses on the body and skin as an artefact carrying traces of the past, physical and psychological. She has been inspired by traditional leather practices as well as the unique doorways in AlUla. Watch to hear her experience of the residency so far!

In AlUla, Manon Wertenbroek collected over 120 photographs of its metal doors which she gathered into a digital archive. As part of her interest in domestic spaces, the door symbolises the passage between private and public, suggesting a sense of inaccessibility while allowing room for projection. Her research led to the creation of this sculpture, manifesting her interest in the geometric patterns and patinas of the doors. The title refers directly to the notes and signatures written on each. « I was here », 2023, locally sourced leather tinted with natural dyes, palladium-plated brass, stainless steel piercings, 121 x 35 x 3,5 cm. The sculpture is an outcome of Wertenbroek’s research around the geometric patterns and patinas of the doors. The title refers directly to the notes and signatures written on them.

Through this series of light sculptures “Conatus” made out of latex, acrylics and textile mixed with sand and pigments from the desert of AlUla, Manon Wertenbroek creates a connection between landscape and body, recalling the energies and memories of the places she visited during her AlUla Artist Residency.

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Abu Abdullah (b. 1990, Saudi Arabia) exhibited at Kunstverein in Hamburg, Hamburg; Athr, Jeddah; Centre D’art contemporain Geneve, Geneva; Art Jameel, Dubai; 12th Gwangju Biennale, Gwaghju; Sharjah Biennial 11, Sharjah; Diriyah Biennale, Riyadh; Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, Oregon; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Serpentine Galleries Marathons, London; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Copenhagen; Luma Foundation, Zurich.

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