Goddy Leye

Goddy Leye is a visual artist living and working in Bonendale, Douala. He is also the founder of the Art Bakery, a centre concerned with the promotion of media related art works and practices in Cameroun and central Africa at large. He is best known today as a video artist, but his activities include painting, installation, performance and drawing.  He works closely on memory and all related myths and mysteries that lie below surfaces. Goddy joined historian and artist Pascal Kenfack in his private studio in Yaoundé for an extensive art training that lasted for five years, before he started working as an independent artist in 1992. He had numerous solo exhibitions in an array of cities that include Fribourg, Douala, Yaoundé and Santa Monica. He also showed in group exhibitions in different cities in Africa, America and Europe. He has extensive experience in various residency programmes, including one in the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam in 2001 – 2002, one in the Alliance Franco-Camerounaise in Dschang  in 2000, one in the 18th Street Arts Complex, Santa Monica in California in 1999, one in the National Institute of Arts in Bamako in 1994 and one in the School of Fine Art in Grenoble in 1993.

Art Bakery

Douala, Cameroon

An artist’s initiative aimed at developing contemporary art in the region.  Current projects include ArtDaily (a year-long program which aims to provide greater understanding of art history and criticism to journalists and writers), the Portfolio Program (a mini-residency project designed for young artists from within and from outside, to develop a new body of work and to develop a more professional approach to one's presentation, so as to enable them to smoothly get into the art world), the Bakery (a small production unit allowing the development of multimedia works of art), MasterClass (a grassroots training program for artists based upon cultural exchange and interaction), and the Nursery (a program aiming at introducing artists in local schools and at bringing pupils from local schools into art studios).

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