Babi Badalov
Lives and works in Paris.
Born in 1959 in Lerik (Republic of Azerbaijan), Babi Badalov now lives in Paris.
Babi Badalov’s pratice is a constant exploration of the limits of the language. He is particularly interesting in the way that language is able to isolate individuals from the people who don’t share the same language. Thereby, the artist covers current geo-political topics that echoes his own personnal experiences.
Babi Badalov was recently in the spotlight for participating at the first ever Metaverse protest, by providing NFT t-shirts and protest signs to the participants. This follows the acquisition of three of his works by the Museo Reina Sofia (Madrid) in 2021, and more recently by the City of Paris Museum of Modern Art and the Stedelijk Museum of Amsterdam.
Plus
After having lived in Russian, he tried to settle in Cardiff (UK), but his asylium application was refused. Sent back in Azerbaijan, he finally got the right to stay and live in France in 2011.
Great traveler and poet himself, Babi Badalov often introduces his own texts in his work : by combinating it with manipulated political pictures, he creates installations, objects, paintings and happenings that he used to qualified as « visual poetry ».
He benefited from many solo shows, at Palais de Tokyo, Paris (FR), the Biennale de Gwanju, Nouveau Musée d’Art Moderne, Saint-Petersburg, MHKA, Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp – Cultural centre de Werft, Geel (BE), Le Cyclop, Milly-la-Forêt (FR), CASCO Art Institute, Utrecht (NL), La Verrière – Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, Bruxelles (BE), Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art, Paris (FR) and the Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne (CH).
Group shows include the Stedelik Museum, Amsterdam (NL), National Center for Contemporary Art, Moscow (RU), Benaki Museum of Art, Athens (GR), M HKA, Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp (BE), Le Plateau, FRAC Ile de France, Paris (FR), MOCAK Museum of Contemporary Art of Krakow (PL), Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (FR), Villa Arson, Nice (FR), Les Abattoirs, Frac Occitanie, Toulouse (FR), Musée de l’Art Soviétique de Kmytiv, Kmytiv (UA), Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Moscow (RU), La Galeria Municipal do Porto, Porto (PT), Maison Populaire, Montreuil, (FR), Bétonsalon, Centre d’art et de recherches, Paris (FR), Kunsthalle Wien, Vienne (AT), Kunst Meran Merano Arte, Meran (BZ), Centre Pompidou Metz (FR), PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv (UKR), Centre d’Art Transpalette à Bourges (FR), MATHAF – Arab Museum of Modern Art, Qatar (QAT).
Several Babi Badalov’s artworks are part of international public collections such as the Museo Reina Sofia (Spain), the City of Paris Museum of Modern Art (France), the Stedelijk Museum of Amsterdam (Netherlands), FRAC Ile-de-France (France), FRAC Midi-Pyrénées les Abattoirs de Toulouse (France), Russian Museum in St. Petersburg (Russia), MuHKA Museum Contemporary Art Antwerp (Belgium), Azerbaijan State Museum of Art in Baku (Azerbaïjan), Kunstmuseum of Emden (Germany), Martigny Art Museum (Switzerland), Oetcker Collection in Bielefeld (Germany), Arina Kowner Collection in Zurich (Switzerland) and Zimmerli Art Museum (New Jersey, USA).
More Infos
Works
News & Press
Exhibitions at the Gallery
Filter
The Last Museum
May 16 - August 2, 2025
Babi Badalov, To Walk, to Work, to Die
February 9 - March 9, 2024
The First Stone
October 13 - December 2, 2023
Ecce Homo
02 Jul. – 13 Aug. 2022
L’Obscur vient au Jour, Group Show
24 Jun. – 30 Jul. 2022
Rainbow Gravity
June 20 – July 18, 2020
The Border is a State of Mind
October 13 – November 16, 2018
Babi Badalov, De More Cry Sea
24 Mar. – 27 May. 2018
Witness
February 4 – March 4, 2017
Drawing by Numbers
January 27 – March 3, 2018
Babi Badalov, Art is Myth I am Real
May 20 - June 20, 2015
Matérialisme Hystérique
October 18 - November 29, 2014
