baminLa

Baminla comes from Togo and has lived in Belgium for 6 years. Nowadays he lives in the city of Charleroi. He visits Globe Aroma approximately 2 or 3 times a week. He is multi-talented, a singer, a painter and a dancer. A friend introduced him to Globe Aroma, and afterwards he kept coming back to paint, or to meet new people. Baminla spent 15 years in Togo, learning to paint professionally. Singing is something that the artist does regularly, singing as a way to deal with stressful moments in his life, giving expression to personal feelings and emotions, putting the world into words. He experiences for instance much problems with regards to how the Belgian authorities deal with migrants, terming the system hypocritical, in terms of democracy and human rights, providing different and unequal opportunities for newcomers in relation to Belgian citizens.

“An example of this hypocrisy is the police raid, the brutality, the humiliation. I have my papers, and when I show my papers, they tell me: “you know, if you do not like it here, what we are doing to you, you can leave, move out and live elsewhere!”. Then it was clear for me, I am not welcome here. They should give me respect, but instead they tell me: the paper is not important, we treat you as we want to”

Painting, singing, and dancing are three different things for Baminla. Dance, for instance, is for him more like a sport, it takes energy and you can do it with many people. During the interview, it became apparent that Globe aroma as a space for political expression is very important for Baminla.

“Globe Aroma as a space is important, it is not a political space. The people here are united, people work together, combatting the system. If we work, we are the artists, and together we combat the system, in the sense that we are free here to speak about the things we encounter outside”

Baminla does not have any paintings that deal with combatting the system, he admits, but when he sings this is more the case. Overall, he sees singing and painting as a way to capture his own emotions, his experiences.

“My paintings are about me, about my life, about different emotions”

Sometimes he paints without an idea on forehand, but mostly his artwork comes from deep emotions inside, feeling he needs to do something with it, and then it takes a couple of days to finish the painting. After finishing a painting, he feels mentally and emotionally liberated.

“Globe aroma is a place where many of my friends are, I come here to see if everything is alright, to meet people, it is like my workshop”

Additionally, Globe Aroma as a space is for Baminla a place to learn more about Belgium, getting into contact with Belgians in Globe Aroma. He tries to sell several of his paintings, using Globe Aroma as a platform to exhibition his art and spur the interest of potential buyers. “I cannot put them all on the wall, I do not have a big enough house to hang all my paintings”, he jokingly comments. When asked what his paintings are mainly about, if they do not serve a political function of dissent, he responds that his paintings mainly deal about the life, more ordinary things, but there are also some other themes inherent in his work. He states that he often works around “the relation between men and women”. Another aspect that is recurring in Baminla’s paintings is transnationalism, as the painter likes to paint about his home country, Togo.

“The police says to me here: ‘Belgium is not your house, this is the law, we ask you for your papers and if you do not have them, you’re not welcome’”, he says in a serious tone, “in Togo, we have the same situation, but also there life goes on, I will continue making art here at Globe Aroma”.

“It is now a little bit different to go here, I know these police raids from my own country in Togo, but not there, but now I am in Belgium, six years nothing happened and now I am in shock – there is not a big difference between Belgium and Togo, they have no right to do this, but they have an uniform and you have nothing to say”