Contemporary African Artists at Richard Taittinger in New York city.

One has to hand it to New York. There is no need to take a plane to be immersed in another culture. I was on my way to the Lower East Side to attend the opening of an exhibition on African artists at the Richard Taittinger gallery. I got off the subway at Grand street and as I stepped out of the train on the subway platform I was engulfed in a sea of Asian people of all ages waiting for the train. None of them were tourists and I felt conspicuous as the only white person there. I emerged from the underground and arrived at the gallery where I was transported to yet another continent: Africa. I did not need to take my passport, go through security and log in hours of travel time. What a treat!

I was eager to see the exhibition. It is a rare occasion in New York for a gallery that does not focus on African artists to give them a whole summer show. That is a step in the right direction!

I loved the catchy and evocative title. “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” with its direct reference to Sidney Poitier 1967 film. It is full of resonance for an American public still contending with past and present racial issues.

However according to guest curator, Ugochukwu-Smooth C. Nzewi,  with the increased visibility of African artists it was people’s ideas and assumptions about Africanness that was on the table here and the necessity to have them challenged. He quoted Chika Okeke-Agulu, a Nigerian author and professor at Princeton University, as the inspiration behind the selection.

” Folks can’t seem to come to terms with the fact that African artists have now taken and secured their seat at the dinner table, invited or not!”

Nzewi knows what he is talking about. Co-curator of the 2014 Dakar Biennale and currently the curator at the Hood Museum at Dartmouth College he has curated many exhibitions in Nigeria , South Africa and the US. His recent book is the co-edited volume New spaces for Negotiating art (and) Histories, focusing on independent art spaces and initiatives in Africa.

Aida Muluneh

Standing in front of Aida Muluneh’s photographic triptych Ugochukwu explained that Aida had been inspired by the story of Brazilian soccer player Dani Alves who when a banana was thrown at him during a game reacted with humor and poise,  calmly picking it up, peeling it, eating it and resumed playing. He challenged preconceptions of the African man as being reactionary and violent. While referencing this incident Mulaneh further highlights the constructed idea of Africanness by manipulating the image so that the black skin of the model looks like it was painted on.

Photography was the strongest area of the show. I loved the cover photo of the exhibition taken from Algerian artist Halida Boughnet’s acclaimed Pandora series. In Diner des Anonymes three children, black and white, inhabit the space around and under the dining table dressed with all the trappings of a bourgeois household. Noticeable is the lack of connection that exist between the figures.

Amalia Ramanankirahina

Artist Amelia Ramanankirahina from Madagascar speaks in her series Family portrait”of unstable identity. Working with portraits of another era she covers the faces with a shroud like shape and the only identifiers left are the various old costumes worn by the figures.

Gopal Dagnogo

Gopal Dagnogo ‘ paintings reference a hazy and chaotic world – almost dream like.  Elements of the modern world – signifiers of our consumer society such as sneakers, chairs, cans of food – merge with elements of the animal life into a poetic, instable, whole, teetering on the brink of chaos.

Uche Uzorka

In a different vein, more overtly structured are the paintings and drawings of Uche Uzorka. Inspired by the processes of urban street culture he made this large abstract collage where white mask like shapes hover over the surface of the painting like white ghosts haunting the streets.

Some of the limitations of the show were the result of the constraints set by the gallerist; only two-dimensional works could be included and shipping costs had to be kept to a minimum. However I welcomed the opportunity of seeing work never shown in New York and new to me. Furthermore I commend the Richard Taittinger gallery for reaching out to a Nigerian curator instead of an American one. We need to truly get an African perspective and not a Western perspective of what is “good “art in Africa.