Munana Gatera

I am a Belgian painter of Rwandan origin. I was born in Burundi and work between Brussels and Lisbon. Self-taught, I have worked for more than twenty years in painting, tapestry and cut paper, between the abstract and the figurative.

Toast Gallery represented me early on, in Paris and then in Brussels. My work is held in private collections in Belgium and abroad. I make everything by hand, in the atelier.

My work

Everything starts with painting; tapestry and cut paper carry it beyond the frame. Some canvases become rugs in wool, viscose and bamboo, in numbered editions of seven. The paper I cut by hand with a scalpel, and the pieces are made to hang without a frame. My motifs come from Rwandan culture: the Intore dance, the Inyambo cattle, the inzu house.

The atelier

Since 2021 I have worked and shown my work at INZU — "home" in Kinyarwanda — my atelier and showroom in Brussels, by appointment. Each edition is documented and comes with a certificate of authenticity.

BIOGRAPHY

I was born in Burundi. I spent my childhood in Nyanza, Rwanda, with my grandparents, then in Congo, before arriving in Brussels at twelve. I trained in fashion styling and worked internationally as a model; those years of travel still feed the palette and imagery of my painting.

I came to painting in 2002, at twenty-five. Toast Gallery took me on in Paris, where I lived and exhibited for several years; in 2006 I was among the artists chosen for the opening of the gallery in Brussels.

In 2010, after a photographic collaboration with Studio Verne in Ghent, I developed Walk on Art with the Belgian manufacturer Didden & Co, a first collection of rugs drawn from my paintings. The S+ collection for Maison Kesar followed, then a year-long exhibition at Hotel Le Méridien in Brussels (UnLock Art) and Dolls for Charity, alongside Diane von Furstenberg and Edouard Vermeulen.

In 2014 I founded my Atelier d’Art et Couture with the designer Marie-Liesse Maréchal. In 2017 the AG Memorial Van Damme commissioned me to paint the Olympic champion Nafissatou Thiam; the portrait was auctioned for Thousand Hills of Hope to rebuild a paediatric ward in Kansi, Rwanda. Since 2020 I have worked mainly in tapestry and cut paper. In 2021 I opened INZU, my atelier and showroom in Brussels. In 2024 LKFF Art Projects in Beersel showed my recent cut-paper installations.

EXHIBITIONS & COLLECTIONS

IN THE ATELIER