GYPSYLAND
Retrospective of the Life Works of Outsider Artist Damian Le Bas
“Gypsy Europa is my dream, just like Martin Luther King’s dream. My maps are a subversive imaginary conquest, a Roma resistance against racism and right wing propaganda.”
– Damian Le Bas
The works in this retrospective are reflective of different aspects of Damian Le Bas’ artistic career including maps, in which he visually subverted ideas of boundaries and borders, Gypsy Dada, objects, sketch books and archive material from his studio as well as a selection of works made in collaboration with the artist Gabi Jimenez. The exhibition was complemented by images along with Damian’s tattoo drawings, a result of a photographic collaboration with Karol Radziszewski, started through the residency at Jaw Dikh! in Czarna Góra, Poland.
“There is no Gypsy country,
there are no Gypsy borders, there are no maps that show the infrastructure of the underground world of the Gypsies.
Conflict and war are all about borders. The conflicts are planned on maps. War and regimes displace people... Some of my maps hopefully make people see that the soul of the Roma is here to stay.
Gypsies have never started a war with anyone but with my pens I have made Artistic Conquests for the Gypsy Empire and shown the network possibilities for a race that represents freedom for mankind.
A world without Gypsies would be a dull place indeed.”
– Damian Le Bas in Lo Squaderno n.7
“Damian created a Gypsyland that has no limitations, not confined by boundaries or borders, fluid in ideas, positive in enabling abilities, taking the negatives and making them positives.”
– Delaine Le Bas
1st Roma Biennale
After decades of advocacy for representation of Roma art and culture, Damian Le Bas was the Initiator of COME OUT NOW! 1st Roma Biennale 2018. The biennale is the voice of Roma to say WE ARE HERE, COME OUT NOW!