"NATURAL MYSTIC" Painting Exhibiton. May 3-31, 2025
Opening Reception Saturday, May 3, 6:30-8:30

Issa Sow, born in Dakar, Senegal in 1975, is a contemporary Senegalese autodidact painter and a gallerist. In 1999, he moved to Montpellier, France, where he lived for several years before landing in New Jersey with his wife and children.

In 2012, Issa Sow opened the doors of the Issyra Art Gallery, in
Hoboken, New Jersey, which presents local and international artists,handpicked traditional and contemporary African artworks, an extensive collection of Sow’s own body of work in addition to music, dance, and painting workshops supporting Sow in his mission to spread the African culture and his childhood memories of teranga.

While Issa Sow does not conform to a specific art movement in his
paintings, his artistic practice examines the interaction of elements found in both the conscious and unconscious minds by way of unveiling fears and conflicts informed by African oral history and contemporary societal issues to represent the duality that exists in all things in life. Mixing recycled materials and organic colors such as those from coffee, hibiscus or fruits with traditional paints, Sow recurrently makes use of symbols; those of the human, animal, and divinity, not only to confer history but also to protect and help fulfill the viewers' wishes and longings. His work can be read as a spontaneous extension of the practices surrounding Traditional African Masks, wherein his paintings become the medium that enables a dialogue between the spirits and the people.

This spontaneity is also found early in his life. At the age of 9,
Issa Sow leaves school to be home-taught by his father. Given his
inability to write during this period, he extemporaneously developed his craft by drawing every time he was in possession of a pen and by creating his own toys using abandoned items. It is only years later, after being married and having children, that he realized his talent. Women have had an important role in Sow's acceptance of his gift, which led to the appearance of the feminine beauty throughout his paintings. Thanks to his mother who continues the oral transmission of African history and African values and the unconditional love of his wife, many of his artworks integrate the strength of women, and particularly, their innate ability to give birth while granting power to their male counterparts with unshivered humility.