Omar Victor Diop
DIASPORA
Photography
2014

Identity and discovery, on both collective and personal levels, are the main themes of the Diaspora project. Constituting a journey through time, this photographic series reveals and deepens a story rarely told about the role of Africans outside Africa. Thus casting a new gaze upon a certain conception of history, he provides answers to his perpetual questioning, to his dialogue with himself about his identity, as an artist and as an individual. For this initial chapter, he focused on 15th to 19th century Europe. Inspired by the multitude of baroque artworks that were created during that time, Diop sees this era as the beginning of a period of intensive interactions (which didn’t exist before) between Africa and the rest of the world. By taking inspiration from portraits of African public figures that made their mark on European history, Diop opposes and compares his own life journey and his legacy to theirs, while retracing the unique destinies of travelers and all those who find themselves in a foreign environment. For the first time, he places himself in his art, simultaneously adopting the posture of the narrator and a character and forcing himself to confront his own doubts.

About the artist

Omar Victor Diop. Born in 1980 in Dakar. Since his early days, Omar Victor Diop developed an interest for Photography and Design, essentially as a means to capture the diversity of modern african societies and lifestyles.​ The quick success of his first conceptual project Fashion 2112, le Futur du Beau which was featured at the Pan African Exhibition of the African Biennale of Photography of 2011 in Bamako (Rencontres de Bamako) encouraged him to end his carrer in Corporate Communications to dedicate to photography in 2012. Omar Victor Lives in Dakar, his body of work includes Fine Arts and Fashion Photography as well as Advertising Photography. He enjoys mixing his photography with other forms of art, such as costume design, styling and creative writing. His work is interrogative and intriguing, prospective, yet a tad vintage and draws inspiration from Diop’s international uplifting, as well as his African visual heritage.

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Courtesy: the artist and Galerie Magnin-A