The Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art presents The Time of Harvests (Le Temps des récoltes), an exhibition of unprecedented scale in France by Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama, accompanied by nine associated artists: Dorothy Akpene Amenuke, Gideon Appah, James Barnor, Cercle d’Art des Travailleurs de Plantation Congolaise, Courage Dzidula Kpodo & Postbox Ghana, Zohra Opoku, Tjaša Rener, Feda Wardak.

Ibrahim Mahama envisions for the Fondation Cartier a living entity that resonates with the art centers he founded in Tamale, northern Ghana. Together with associated artists, he will occupy all the spaces of the institution, located on Place du Palais-Royal, with works created specifically for the site, as well as new versions of some of his iconic installations.

Since its inception, the Fondation Cartier has established itself as a space for dialogue, experimentation, and artistic exploration, attentive to the places where contemporary creation emerges and the voices that resonate within it. From the 1990s onward, it played a pioneering role in presenting artists from the African continent, such as Seydou Keïta, Bodys Isek Kingelez, Malick Sidibé, JD ‘Okhai Ojeikere, and Chéri Samba. It is within this tradition that Le Temps des récoltes (Harvest Time ), Ibrahim Mahama’s first Parisian exhibition, takes its place, for which he collaborates with nine artists and collectives.

Ibrahim Mahama (born in 1987 in Tamale, Ghana) has established himself on the international scene with his installations created from collected materials, archives, and fragments of industrial heritage, which he reactivates to shape new imaginaries. Since the 2010s, he has developed a body of work based on the exploration of Ghana’s colonial and postcolonial legacies. Drawing on his country’s industrial and commercial history, he examines the circulation of goods, the transmission of know-how, and the preservation of heritage. His work highlights political, social, and economic continuities and ruptures, paying particular attention to infrastructure, traces of the past, and collective dynamics.

Conceived by Ibrahim Mahama with nine artists and collectives, all linked to him through long-standing collaborations, research, or exchanges, the exhibition *Harvest Time* is a direct continuation of this approach. It echoes the three art centers founded by the artist in Tamale, northern Ghana, since 2019. Designed as spaces for creation, transmission, and local engagement, these centers contribute to the emergence of a network of independent cultural institutions across the African continent, where pedagogy plays a central role. Ibrahim Mahama’s centers engage in dialogue with parallel initiatives across Africa. These include doual’art in Douala, Cameroon, founded in 1991 by Marilyn Douala Bell and Didier Schaub, which is considered a pioneer; the Centre for Contemporary Art Lagos (CCA) in Nigeria, initiated in 2007 by Bisi Silva; and RAW Material Company in Dakar, founded in 2008 by Koyo Kouoh. and more recently the Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute (NCAI) in Kenya, opened in 2020 by the Anglo-Kenyan artist Michael Armitage.

Each of these institutions has, in its own way, invented new sustainable models in constant dialogue with its environment. Echoing these initiatives, the exhibition explores the political, cultural, and social utopias formulated at the time of African independence in the 1950s and 1960s, and proposes to reactivate these visions in order to examine possible futures.

For the exhibition, Ibrahim Mahama presents new works conceived specifically for the space, as well as previously unseen versions of a selection of his most iconic installations, including Parliament of Ghosts. This installation, which takes the form of a parliamentary chamber, is made from traditional Ashanti wooden chairs on which visitors are invited to sit. The work embodies Ibrahim Mahama’s collective and living practice, shaping the present by creating spaces of life and potential from ancient materials. Emptied of its representatives, this “ghost” parliament becomes a metaphor for a failed democracy, echoing the 1966 coup in Ghana and the dissolution of the government. Throughout the exhibition, Parliament of Ghosts becomes a circular stage, animated by a program combining music, performances, talks, and discussions. It also hosts a series of masterclasses and lectures in collaboration with art schools.

Ibrahim Mahama also presents a monumental architectural installation designed specifically for the Fondation Cartier building, entitled Things Fall Apart, a reconstruction of a former Ghanaian glass bottle factory made from the original materials. Opened in 1966 in the southwest of the country, this factory was among the last major decentralization projects of the first president, Kwame Nkrumah, before his fall from power. By purchasing this abandoned factory and dismantling it for relocation to Tamale, Ibrahim Mahama reactivates it as an artwork and learning space, reintegrating Ghana’s industrial heritage into a narrative of the future. Finally, the artist will create a textile installation for the arcades on the façade of the Fondation Cartier, visible from the Place du Palais-Royal.

Ibrahim Mahama: The Time of Harvests
Oct 22, 2026 – Feb 28, 2027
Foundation Cartier
Paris, France