Fair - Frieze London 2025
Mélinda Fourn, Il n’y aura plus que des cendres V, 2025. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur.
October 15-19, 2025, Regent's Park, London
On the occasion of Frieze London 2025, Selebe Yoon is pleased to present a dual booth by Franco-Beninese artist Mélinda Fourn and Franco-Guadeloupean-Congolese artist Naomi Lulendo in the section Echoes in the Present, curated by Dr. Jareh Das.
In Mélinda Fourn’s (b. 1995) practice, the question of heritage, of the transmission of traditional know-hows and of issues related to the body, jewelry and ornamentation play a fundamental role. On the occasion of Echoes in the Present, the artist conceives a series of seven sculptures, entitled ‘Il n’y aura plus que des cendres’ [There will be nothing but ashes], which evokes experiences of loss, grief, and finally metamorphosis, intertwined with an existence in-between two continents. Each sculpture is composed of a circular pottery base from asanka cooking pots she gathered in the Ghanaian village Afari of women-potters, while the upper part reveals the artist’s own ceramics made in France. Encompassing tension between balance and fragility, violence and delicacy, the column-like structures recall the piles of bowls in markets in Ghana, culminating with ornamented reclining or standing darker jars. Beads made of recycled glass by the artist, synthetic hair, textile sewn by her hands, ropes, chains, a padlock found on a renowned Parisian bridge, banana leaves from Kumasi – all these elements envelop the sculptures in a caring act, tying together components from both France and West Africa. As the artist saves discarded units from potters’ workshops, this practice of assemblage simultaneously allows her to conceal and repair parts considered defective, consequently counteracting the object’s initial function. Each sculpture becomes a human metaphor, where renewal is succeeded by despair then hope. ”Isaiah 43:26” is a separate hanging piece, with alternating patterns and varying ochre tones that echo the traditional Kenté cloth, made from dried and emptied tea bags with excerpts of poems written by the artist. As sewing becomes sculpting, Mélinda Fourn attempts to heal not only the disposable and forgettable, but also celebrates fragility through reparation.
Naomi Lulendo, Panorama (Les Ombres) II, 2025. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur.
Naomi Lulendo (b. 1994) probes symbols from different geographical spaces to understand their connection to a given territory, whether real or fantasised. Her jigsaw puzzle works from the "Belle de…" series reveal her own photographed distorted body merged into the background and consumed by floral patterns. These works are rooted in the iconography of the archetypal aquatic and fluvial figures of the Naiads, Mermaids and Mami Wata, with the idea of an ambivalent or hidden, identity. Evoking celestial events, each figure reveals a state - states of being that embody the beauty of the world, its apogee or its decline. This interplay of visual textures also emphasises the textile and historical dimension of the images created, as each background is a fragment of Indienne, a type of cotton fabric from Asia, particularly India, once highly prized for the quality of its workmanship and colours, which contributed to the economic boom of the textile industry in Europe, notably in the United Kingdom and France. As if melting, Lulendo’s body becomes an ornamental element in the image, fully intertwined into the background, recalling the massive exploitation of black bodies as the foundation for the expansion of the western textile industry. Each representation of her body is subject to printing glitches that blur the boundaries between handmade and digital. At times, a single missing puzzle piece states discreetly that the image isn’t complete and invites one to play with the possibilities. Through a play on perception, as much formal as historical, the series aims above all to hold up a mirror to our relationship with screens, myths and collective legacies. In her paintings from the “Panorama (Les Ombres)” series, Naomi Lulendo crafts landscapes that are at times familiar yet bewildering, playing on the perplexing frontier between interior and exterior spaces. They evoke windows and breeze blocks, architectural elements associated with places such as Guadeloupe or Senegal, offering a meditative glimpse to an elsewhere. Drawn to the initial phase of nigredo (the spiritual blackness in alchemy), Lulendo considers black not only as a colour containing the whole chromatic specter - thus, the calcined surface of her works alludes to a place between annihilation and rebirth, while the reflecting light gently calls to surface dissimilated flowery patterns.
Together, both artists reflect upon the possibility of renewal and transformation, experienced in one’s lifetime.
OPENING HOURS FRIEZE LONDON
Wednesday Preview, 15 October: 11am - 7pm (invitation only)
Thursday Preview, 16 October: (Members and invitation only preview) 11am – 1pm / (General admission) 1pm - 5pm
Friday, October 17: 11am - 7pm
Saturday, 18 October: 11am - 7pm
Sunday, 19 October: 11am - 6pm