Jercy Nsiala

About

Jercy Nsiala was born in Kinshasa on October 7, 1988. He was educated at Collège Boboto before turning to painting, and trained at the Académie des Beaux-Arts de Kinshasa from 2010 to 2013. He continued at Les Ateliers Botembe, the workshop of the painter Roger Botembe (also a formative teacher for Patrick Kusakana), and at Les Ateliers Palabre, sharpening his oil and acrylic technique. His primary medium stayed his own: sand worked into acrylic, with oil for some pieces.

A condition that affects his moral mobility shapes the vantage point Nsiala works from, part of how he observes his surroundings and puts them on canvas. His paintings take up social themes and cultural narratives from there, returning often to questions of cultural identity and the pressures a society places on the people living inside it. Among his declared influences, alongside Botembe, is Pablo Picasso.

His exhibition record runs across Congo and abroad, most notably the “Migration de Couleur” series, shown in several French cities. Individual paintings, among them “La traversée” (2016), “Brave” (2018), and “The Cries of the Ancestors” (2022), trace a practice that has stayed with sand, acrylic, and oil across more than a decade. His paintings put a question to the viewer as often as they offer an image, engagement built in alongside description.

This page gathers Jercy Nsiala’s work in one place online. The portfolio is below.

Portfolio