CALIFIA (Heritier Bilaka)

I pay tribute, through a symbolic and surrealist approach to female figure inspired by a story described as the legend of Queen Califia, that of a black Amazon queen ruling over the mythical island of “California,” a paradise populated solely by warrior women, described in the 16th-century Spanish novel: Las Sergas de Esplandián as well the Amazons of Dahomey who were in fact an all-female military regiment of the Kingdom of Dahomey (present-day Benin), and the warrior Queen Nzinga of the Kongo