Sculpture: wood, aluminium, steel 1000x217x257 cm

Photo: 6 Light Jet Prints mounted on aluminium 120x150cm (each)

Maison Tropicale, reflects on colonial history and its contemporary, post-and-neo-colonial resonances. After World War II, the French Overseas Ministry, through collaboration with the French designer Jean Prouvé, saw the possibility to further develop modernist ideas of conceiving a series of aesthetically sophisticated pre-fabricated houses in Africa. Only three propotypes ultimately left Prouvé’s workshop. In 1949, the first Tropical House was transported by plane to Niger, Niamey. Two other houses were transported to the Congo, Brazzaville. With the (re)discovery of Prouvé’s ‘work’ in the 1990s, the house also incited new interest and became part of a process of fetishisation of Prouvé’s prodution. The three Tropical Houses were dismantled and transported to France where they were restored and subsequently presented and sold in the United States.