Armand Boua Ivory Coast, b. 1978

Boua was born in 1978 in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, where he lives and works. He paints the street children of his hometown Abidjan as subjects. Boua is noted for his layered texture and compositions, using tar and acrylic on found cardboard. Each layer is applied and then cleaned and stripped, leaving abstract shapes. His use of found materials – recycling cardboard boxes used as makeshift shelters by street children – shows a strong commitment to his environment. Boua achieves a fine balance between his heavy gestures and violent execution and the smooth treatment of his subject, both silent and subtle.

He studied painting at the National School of Fine Arts (Abidjan), as well as at the Technical Center for Applied Arts. He is also graduated in Graphic Art at the Sainte Marie Training Institute and has studied the different peoples of the Ivory Coast at the Museum of Civilization.

Since 2002, he has participated in several exhibitions located in Ivory Coast (2002, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011), Sweden (2009), Senegal (7th Bienal of Contemporary African Art, 2009), Morocco (2010) and Great Britain, were he protagonized a solo exhibition (Gallery Jack Bell, London, 2014).

He has been interviewed by several media as Canal + horizon “Senegal”, Africa Culture, Art in Movement-RTI-(Ivory Coast), ONUCI-FM Radio-(Ivory Coast) and Radio JN 96.6 Blessed soil (Ivory Coast).

Recent acquisitions of Boua's works have been made by the Saatchi Gallery, UK, La Collection Francs - Suss, Hong Kong and the DeLeon Collection Tiroche, Israel.