Jeune tête d’affiche 2026-2027

Po B. K. Lomami

Endling 08 (À la dérive) responds to the sensations of suffocation, drift, and abandonment that accumulated during a short period in which the artist lost several family matriarchs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is part of a series documenting a cycle of performances titled aksanti 33, in which the figure Batamu emerges from a deep sleep into an unknown state, unearthing memories and grief that span from childhood to the present.

I aim to expose, displace, multiply or terminate several forms of work and labour, such as administrative, reproductive, intellectual, emotional, physical, or militant. My art practice emerged from the urgency, strategy, and reclamation of space and time involved in my activist work with LGBTQI youth and Afrofeminism in Europe. My visual work doesn’t set the performances into a fixed moment with regular modes of documentation but instead is an opportunity to feel someone and something that are not there anymore.

Po B. K. Lomami’s practice builds on an autoethnographic and intervention-based approach, combining performance, installation, image, sound, writing, and technological diversion. Born into the Congolese diaspora in Belgium, they have been living in Tiohtià:ke / Mooniyang / Montréal since 2017. They are an undisciplined artist-researcher and university instructor, holding a Master’s in Business Engineering from the University of Namur (2014), a Graduate Diploma in Communication Studies (2022), and an MFA in Studio Arts - Intermedia (2026) from Concordia University. Their work has been presented at articule, Centre culturel Georges-Vanier, Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery, HTMlles, Montréal, arts interculturels, FOFA Gallery, Optica and the International Festival of Films on Art. They are currently an artist-in-residence with Habiter le MAC at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal.

Po B. K. Lomami is the recipient of the 2026-2027 Jeune tête d’affiche contest. Awarded annually, Jeune tête d'affiche gives visibility to a graduate student in visual arts whose image-based practice aligns with Dazibao's mandate.

The selected artist will have their image featured in Dazibao’s programming pamphlet. This brochure benefits from a large distribution locally, nationally, and internationally, thus giving the selected image to considerable exposure.

(Click on the image to see previous posters)

Ioana Dragomir (2025-2026) / Jamie Ross (2024-2025) / Mena El-Shazly (2023-2024) / OK Pedersen (2022-2023) / Jordan Blackburn (2021-2022) / John Boyle-Singfield (2020-2021) / Zinnia Naqvi (2019-2020) / Ralitsa Doncheva (2018-2019) / Emma-Kate Guimond (2017-2018) / Simon Belleau (2016-2017) / Celia Perrin Sidarous (2015-2016) / Didier Morelli (2014-2015) / Rosika Desnoyers (2013-2014) / Alex Kisilevich (2011-2012) / Juan Ortiz-Apuy (2010-2011) / Karen Zalamea (2009-2010) / Atom Deguire (2008-2009)