Marie-Claire Messouma Manlanbien

Fellow
2025 - 2026

Visual arts

Biography

Marie-Claire Messouma Manlanbien (1990, France) is a visual artist who graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Art de Paris-Cergy in 2016. Winner of the Prix 1% Marché de l’art in 2022 and the Prix Grand FORTE grant in 2019, she also did a residency at Gasworks in London. Her work has been shown in solo exhibitions at the Palais de Tokyo (Paris) in 2023 and the Orangerie du Sénat (Paris) in 2021. More recently, her works have been presented in collective shows at the Centre Pompidou Metz, the Centraal Museum (Utrecht), the Toledo Museum of Art, the Fondation Hermès (Brussels), and Manifesta 15 in Barcelona. She has also participated in the Venice Biennale, as part of the Ivory Coast Pavilion, and in the Sydney Biennale.

Project

Her research and creation project revolves around a tapestry with soothing properties. The project will involve studies of Italian tapestries stemming from ancient traditions as well as research conducted in workshops and museums and conversations with local craftspeople, artists, and technicians. This will supplement the work she began some ten years ago in Europe, Africa, and Australia. The research focusing on textiles will be coupled with a study of the Italian pharmacopoeia. The aim is to create tapestries whose operative power is to create bonds and care: in short, modern golden fleeces.

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