JEAN DAVID NKOT WAS BORN IN 1989 IN DOUALA, CAMEROON, WHERE HE LIVES AND WORKS. After painting for his A-levels at the Institute of Artistic Training of Mbalmayo (IFA), he joined the Institute of Fine Arts Foumban where he obtained a degree in drawing and painting. Throughout his training in the fine arts of Foumban, he received several artist distinctions (Best sculptor, installer and painter). In 2017, he joined the « Post-Master » Moving Frontiers, organised by the National School of Arts of Paris-Cergy (France), on the theme of borders. Conscious of what his elders can bring him, he is frequently in the workshops of Hervé Youmbi, Salifou Lindou, Jean Jacques Kanté, Pascal Kenfack and Ruth Belinga. While he is a painter of the human condition, since 2020, he tackles the issue of the exploitation of raw materials in Africa and the economic and political stakes underneath. He now focuses his thought on cotton growing, which he associates with the beginnings of capitalism through its cultivation and trading. He underlines its environmental and human impact and links it to the North/South relationship. Within his work, Nkot compensates for the lack of visibility and recognition of those who work in the shadows. By giving them the status of contemporary icons, he invites us to rethink our economic model to protect ‘man’ and the planet together. A deep sensitivity to humanity has never ceased to exist in his work, ecology is a new component in the work of this painter regarding the human condition. Nkot reminds us that man cannot be considered independent from their environment and that the protection of one comes with the conservation of the other. Nkot’s work has been shown at art fairs in Miami, New York, London, Paris, Marrakech and Cape Town. It has also been exhibited in international institutions such as the Guangdong Times Museum (Guangdong, China), Institut des Cultures d’Islam (Paris, France), SAVVY Contemporary (Berlin, Germany), Kunsthalle Krems (Krems, Austria) and the Fondation Dapper at la Rotonde des arts in Abidjan (Ivory Coast).
