Ibrahim Meïté Sikely: I will Become What I Should Have Been

Galerie Anne Barrault presents the first solo exhibition of Ibrahim Meïté Sikely (b. 1996), a painter whose work explores power relations, turbulence, and the possibilities of resistance through art. A graduate of the Villa Arson (2022) and currently completing his MFA at the Beaux-Arts de Paris, Sikely develops a practice that merges fiction and realism to create intimate, personal fables.

Staging scenes with his loved ones, the artist replays and subverts the social and cultural expectations that weigh on individuals, particularly those shaped by immigrant backgrounds. His paintings are marked by dynamic brushwork and a palette that oscillates between luminous iridescence and intense, saturated tones. This expressivity embodies what the artist calls “turbulence” — a force that resists conformity, challenges stereotypes, and channels a vital, creative energy.

Through this embrace of unruliness, Sikely positions painting as both a space of healing and confrontation. His figures carry the weight of personal and collective memory, yet they are rendered with vitality, tenderness, and defiance. Drawing from cultural references ranging from poetry and rap music to the history of art, his compositions offer a vision of painting as a site where disorder becomes a source of beauty, dignity, and emancipation.