Mariane Ibrahim
CNN Style

Jacqui Palumbo, CNN, April 29, 2022

The Somali-French art dealer bringing Black perspectives to Paris' gallery scene

 

When Gallerist Mariane Ibrahim opened her elegant, new three-story art gallery in Paris last September, she became the firts Black art dealer to set up a shop in the French capital, and, according to the Somali-French art dealer, the first dedicated to showing contemporary art from Africa and its diaspora. 

 

In the forthcoming CNN Originals show 'Nomad with Carlton McCoy" in which sommelier Carlton McCoy explores the lesser-seen side of famous cities and countries, Ibrahim joined him and artist Raphaël Barontini for a home-cooked meal in Barontini's studio in Saint-Denis, a suburb, or "banlieue" of Paris. McCoy said in the episode that he had noticed "a distinct lack of Black and Brown perspectives" in the capital's famed museums.

 

"In France you're exposed to art, but you're exposed to the domination of a culture over others," Ibrahim told him in the episode. "What you are seeing are works of them by them about people like us."