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Photo - Brian Ferry - Courtesy Superhouse
At Superhouse in downtown New York, the exhibition - Celestial City - the exhibition of new sculptures by the international acclaimed Ghanaian artist, Paa Joe. Throughout a career spanning six decades, Paa Joe has explored Ghanaian beliefs on life and death. His carved wooden coffins, known as abeduu adeka, or proverb boxes, take the form of an object intended to glorify the deceased. Over the past 15 years, Paa Joe has transformed the folk craft tradition into Pop art, creating idiosyncratic renditions of daily objects for the global art market. For his debut solo show in New York, the artist chose to pay homage to the city itself creating a portrait of the Big Apple through objects emblematic of the five boroughs, which included two human sized coffins.
Paa Joe - Installation View
Superhouse, the New York gallery founded and directed by Stephen Markos, specializes in contemporary and historical art, furniture and design. It stages exhibitions exploring material, technology, function, and narrative, featuring artists from Africa, the Americas, and Europe.
Stephen Markos
Paa Joe - Heinz - coffin - 2024
Paa Joe - container/box - 2024
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Photos - Brian Ferry - Courtesy Superhouse
Paa Joe, is a member of the Ga community in Accra, Ghana, he was apprenticed with his uncle Kane Kwei, who pioneered figurative coffins in the 1950s. These bespoke coffins symbolize the deceased's identity, like an onion for a farmer or a sardine for a fisherman. After apprenticing from 1960 to 1972, Paa Joe established his own studio, Paa Joe Coffin Works.
Paa Joe - Yellow Cab - coffin - 2024
On show besides the two human sized coffins, scaled down works, providing a glimpse into the diversity of the urban New York. Replicas of Frank Lloyd Wrights's Guggenheim Museum and a Hermes Birkin bag - above - representing the prominent art and fashion industries. It also features exaggerated versions of a bagel, the Statue of Liberty, and a hotdog, symbolizing New York's migrate history, and the city's grittier side with an overflowing trash can and a subway rat.
Paa Joe - Birkin - container/box - 2024
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Paa Joe - Big Apple - 2024