REDIRTRENDER
Project_Pap Souleye Fall takes an in-depth look at urban waste management in an installation created from the large amount of cardboard waste collected during the Symposium. Using a shredder, they break down the cardboard and other waste found in the Baie-Saint-Paul area to create amalgamations of mass and matter. With this pulp, they playfully explore form and material to construct ephemeral structures.
With this project, Pap Souleye Fall expands on their personal concepts of “digital sedimentation” and “imperial debris” (where “imperial debris” refers to waste produced by countries in the Global North and shipped to countries in the Global South) by focusing on landfills and Superfund sites. They focus on how discarded objects continue to carry within them the history or imprint of the people who touched, used, and discarded them, even after being buried, crushed, and transformed.
Bio_Pap Souleye Fall (b. 1994, Washington, DC) is a Senegalese-American artist based in New York City who explores the transmedia potential between mediums including sculpture, installation, performance, cosplay, digital media, and comics. Their work is produced within the context of the African Diaspora. Being of two worlds, Pap Souleye Fall delights in the ability to construct their own reality between the polarities of cultures. As such, they became fascinated with the ways art could be embedded in everyday life. Using common, found, and repurposed materials their multidisciplinary practice explores themes of speculative fiction, challenges the pretext of masculinity, Africanisms, and Afro-futurism. Souleye Fall received an MFA in Sculpture at Yale School of the Arts in 2022, and a BFA in Fine Arts from The University of the Arts (UArts) in 2017. They are currently part of the Sharpe Walentas Residency (Brooklyn, NY). They were recognized by the Dedalus Foundation Fund for Past Fellows & Awardees (2023) and awarded the Black Rock Fellowship (Dakar Senegal). Recent exhibitions include solo and two-person exhibitions at Subtitled NYC, New York (2026); Stellarhighway, New York (2025); Blade Study, New York (2025).
Approach_The work of Pap Souleye Fall focuses on its ability to create ruptures between practices that tie worlds together, reimagining how black/queer people of the diaspora blur edges through transmedias and Pop culture. Souleye Fall defines their practice as non western-centered through using plurality to reimagine, create potential, and bring forth new worlds. They work with videos on monitors, cardboard, clothing and wood that are frequently salvaged or recycled. These materials allow them to create strategies and backdrops for joy and immersive experiences. Pap Souleye Fall echoes the virtual and the physical as a way to source the black imaginary.
