Claudie Titty Dimbeng (Dimbeng) is an Ivorian artist born in 1968. She lived in Germany, Côte d'Ivoire and Austria before settling down in Paris, where she studied Interior Design at the Ecole Supérieure des arts Modernes, from 1987 to 1991.
Dimbeng originated the "Mixed Art Relief" which is inspired by Vohou-vohou, an Ivorian art trend of the 70s with aesthetic and ideological claims, based on identity declaration and the importance of the culture of origin. Vohou-vohou advocates the use of local raw materials and recovered materials such as tapa, burlap, raffia, and natural pigments. Dimbeng combines the technique with the Sfumato, a technique of the Renaissance which consists on superimposing several layers of paint to give the illusion of relief and depth.
Abstract as well as figurative, the "Mixed Art Relief" is a largely symbolic art. It exalts the link between the artist and her land of origin, adoption or passage. The mixing of cultures giving place to a new identity.
The work of Dimbeng is readily feminine, even feminist in her approach. Among other subjects, the Artist addresses birth and gynaeceum. She created controversy with some of the works she exposed in 2012 at the Unesco; representing women and their sex.
Her first exhibition was held at the Lorizon Gallery in Paris in 2002. Since then, her works have been exhibited in Africa, UAE and Europe: at the Quai Branly Museum in 2011, at the UNESCO headquarters (where she represented Côte d'Ivore in 2012), at the Arts Pluriels Gallery in Abidjan (2013) and at the Kino Kino museum in Norway (2015).
Dimbeng lives and works in Paris.