Extrapolating their critique to the demands placed upon Africa by the art market and the culture industry, these artists - Romuald Hazoumé, Dominique Zinkpé e Gérard Quenum - show themselves immune to, if not ignorant of, the self-absorption prevalent in contemporary art. They do not cease to question the processes according to which of African artists in general, and of those from Benin in specific, at once infiltrate and are assimilated by the systems of art and culture.
ost-independence Africa is a space of ambivalence, where the aspirations of her people are, ever so often, opposed by her own leaders and by influences from the outside. Her wealth is largely crippled by the West’s use of financial control to make the continents resources available to its own ends. And in recent years, China’s rapidly intensifying economic influence in Africa has become yet another reminder of a new global actor that feeds on globalization and the resultant economic and political expansion, and who has not shied away from reaching out its tentacles to areas troubled by conflict and weak governance. In this conflicting terrain, we must carry with us the words of Walter Benjamin: “The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the “state of emergency” in which we live is not an exception but a rule.”
Extrapolating their critique to the demands placed upon Africa by the art market and the culture industry, these artists - Romuald Hazoumé, Dominique Zinkpé e Gérard Quenum - show themselves immune to, if not ignorant of, the self-absorption prevalent in contemporary art. They do not cease to question the processes according to which of African artists in general, and of those from Benin in specific, at once infiltrate and are assimilated by the systems of art and culture. 
ost-independence Africa is a space of ambivalence, where the aspirations of her people are, ever so often, opposed by her own leaders and by influences from the outside. Her wealth is largely crippled by the West’s use of financial control to make the continents resources available to its own ends. And in recent years, China’s rapidly intensifying economic influence in Africa has become yet another reminder of a new global actor that feeds on globalization and the resultant economic and political expansion, and who has not shied away from reaching out its tentacles to areas troubled by conflict and weak governance. In this conflicting terrain, we must carry with us the words of Walter Benjamin: “The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the “state of emergency” in which we live is not an exception but a rule.” 
