‘l’Afrique!’ is a fascinating ongoing project by Ingrid Baars inspired by the richness of African cultural heritage in all its diversity, incorporating as it does both the human and the non-human.
The amalgamation of classical African cult objects with fashion and real women enables the artist to transcend the natural and constitute an outer worldly realm that feels near but that is, upon closer inspection, a bit unsettling; the aestheticism and romanticism of beauty are imbued with a deeper sense of awareness, of consciousness. Armed with an innate aesthetic compass and quintessential style she evokes a phantasmagorical universe.
Baars unique style of working is a one-person endeavor from the preliminary photo-shoot to the photographic manipulation (merging photography, high-end fashion and traditional African sculpture). Her works are made entirely by her.