Invasion aquatique
Nominated for the 2026 Marcel Duchamp Prize, artist Josèfa Ntjam has developed a practice that blends sculpture, performance, photomontage, film, and sound.
Gathering the raw material for her work from the Internet, natural science books, and photographic archives, she uses the method of assemblage—of images, words, sounds, and stories—to deconstruct hegemonic discourses on the notions of origin, identity, and race.
Her work weaves together multiple narratives drawn from investigations into historical events, scientific practices, and philosophical concepts, which she juxtaposes with references to African mythologies, ancestral rituals, religious symbolism, and science fiction. This discussion centers on two key elements underlying her work: the archive and sound, which invite us to draw connections between the silences of history, Afrofuturism, and Detroit techno.
She will be in conversation with Mattéo Sita and Ilona Plissonneau, students at the Beaux-Arts de Paris, and Audrey Illouz, cultural programming director.
Josèfa Ntjam was born in 1992 in Metz; she lives and works in Saint-Étienne. She studied in Amiens and at Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar; she also graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Art de Bourges in 2015 and from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Art de Paris-Cergy, France, in 2017.
In 2026, she was among the artists nominated for the Marcel Duchamp Prize, which will be featured in an exhibition at the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris in October, organized in collaboration with the Centre Pompidou in Paris. In 2025, Ntjam was selected to participate in the 36th São Paulo Biennial in Brazil (September 2025–January 2026) and in the MOMENTA Contemporary Art Biennial in Montreal, Canada (September 2025–January 2026). She also presented her largest solo exhibition to date at the Institut d’Art Contemporain (IAC) in Villeurbanne, France (October 2025–January 2026).
Josèfa Ntjam is a member of the Paris-based art and research collective Black(s) to the Future.
Crédit photo : Josèfa Ntjam, swell of spæc(i)es, 2024. Vue d’installation à l’Accademia di Belle Arti de Venise. Événement satellite de la Biennale de Venise 2024. Mandaté par LAS Art Foundation. Courtesy de l’artiste ; LAS Art Foundation. © ADAGP, Paris, 2024. Photo : Andrea Rossetti
