Isha Fofana

28/12/65 Born in Banjul - the Gambia/West Africa.

1984 member of the 'Gambia Black African Art Club'.

1984-1994 Exhibitions of batik artworks in galleries in the Gambia.

1994 Stopped painting because of family problems. Four children.

May 2000 Arrival in Germany.

January 2001 New start of painting.

Autumn 2001 exhibition in Aachen 'African House' Munich.

"I would like to send the message of my past life in my pictures, for the whole world to read them and to see them, like I do and to understand".

When asked to describe her former artwork in Africa?

"It was only like making designs - or whatever, what was in me could not come out - like writing a story. I felt that I was not ready,for example: when you are pregnant, you are carrying everything inside, and I carried all these things that happened to me in my life. I carried them in me for a long time, in the Gambia they could not come out, because of my big family problems.

The moment I came to Germany it was like an explosion, all the stories I had been carrying around the whole time came out.

What are the stories you want to tell with your paintings?

 To express all the stories in me. And these stories are my own life, from my childhood untill now. These are real stories that happened to me, but on the other side, many stories I experienced, especially the things that a woman has to bear in Africa, like female circumcision, violence in the family, or just the daily life. On the otherside all the influence of the culture that we have in our part of Africa, like the power of the masks etc.