Saadane Afif Another Anthology of Black Humor

Exploring African influences on modernist avant-gardes, Saâdane Afif (born 1970) riffs on André Breton's anthology of the same name for this catalogue accompanying his show at MMK Zollamt. For the show, Afif built a coffin based on a Ghanian memento mori, and invited artists and critics to respond.

The French artist Saâdane Afif (b. 1970) – recipient of the acclaimed Marcel Duchamp Prize in 2009 – had his first solo exhibition in a German museum in 2012 at ZOLLAMT MMK in Frankfurt. The title of this exhibition was derived from André Breton’s Surrealist work Anthologie de l’humour noir from 1940. Afif retraced African influences on the European avant-garde and also linked them to modern French art and literature. With a coffin model manufactured in Ghana, he responds to a custom which has recently taken hold in that West African country whereby figurally designed coffins serve as a form of commemoration of the deceased. By virtue of its shape, the coffin entitled L’Humour Noir will makes reference to the Centre Pompidou.