My role as an artist extends beyond the studio. Through initiatives like Elowa and La Grande Place, I see art as a tool for encounter—between generations, geographies, and disciplines—capable of nurturing both creation and collective awareness.
Rafiy Smith Okefolahan (born 1979, Porto-Novo, Benin) is a visual artist working across painting, sculpture, installation, photography, and performance. Based in Paris, he maintains strong ties with Benin, where much of his artistic and cultural engagement is rooted.
He trained in the studios of established artists before studying at the École Nationale des Arts de Dakar (2005–2006). Formative residencies at the Cité Internationale des Arts de Paris (2007) and the Asiko program in Dakar (2014) shaped his interdisciplinary approach. Since the 2010s, his work has been widely exhibited in Africa, Europe, and the United States, with solo presentations at Galerie Lazarew (Paris), Institut Français de Cotonou, Open Art Exchange (Netherlands), and the SCAD Museum of Art (Atlanta). His works are held in public and private collections.
His paintings combine expressionist gesture with imagery drawn from West African spiritual traditions, daily labor, and collective ritual. Beneath their chromatic intensity lies a sustained critical project addressing unchecked industrialization, environmental degradation, social inequality, and the erosion of collective memory.
Alongside his studio practice, Okefolahan is a committed cultural organizer. In 2008, he founded the association Elowa to foster intercultural exchange between artists in France and Benin. In 2019, he established La Grande Place in Porto-Novo, a cultural center dedicated to residencies, exhibitions, and professional training for emerging practitioners, where he serves as artistic director.
Recent projects reflect his growing engagement with environmental consciousness, including the 2023 initiative Danser, illustrer et inventer l’environnement des berges lagunaires and his participation in MIACE, a research collective examining the impact of art on ecological awareness. In 2025, his public art project ORIGINES, focused on questions of identity, received first prize and funding from Benin’s Fonds de Développement des Arts et de la Culture.