Contemporary artists speak of Heaven, Purgatory and Hell!

Sometimes things work out well. I was long overdue for a visit to a dear friend in Charleston and there was a large exhibition of Contemporary African art at the SCAD in Savannah. So I found myself touring the old quarters of Savannah and Charleston, places of old privilege wholly supported at the time by the slave trade and pondering the work of African artists exploring Dante’s themes of Hell, Purgatory and Heaven.

The exhibition called The Divine Comedy had been curated by the writer and art critic Simon Njami and was traveling from Germany where it was shown at the Museum Für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt. Including original commissions and renowned works of art by approximately 40 of the most dynamic contemporary artists from 19 African nations and the diaspora it was to stay in Savannah for four months and then travel to Washington D.C. Since exhibitions of African artists are hard to come by in the United States I was thrilled that two US cities were included in the tour. I had bought the thick catalogue prior to the visit and had attempted to read the essays by Simon Njami and others to understand how Dante Alghieri’s Divine Comedy related to the works selected. The premise of the exhibition was that Dante’s visions are applicable to many cultures and religions. In fact, the catalogue failed to elucidate the connection. A selection of very erudite essays left me feeling confused as to the artists’ thinking and process as they responded to Dante’s work. I could not understand the necessity to validate the work of African artists by showing their ability to relate to a great work of Western literature from the 14^th Century. The premise seemed an artificial construct.

However, I liked the exhibition very much. The works were at times provocative, thoughtful, beautiful, relevant, and poignant. While there was no wall text there were students available to answer any question we had which allowed for a livelier visit and also a more direct experience. I was there with my friend who knew nothing about art coming from Africa and was very eager.

 

 

The exhibition was organized according a reversal of the order of the three states laid out in Dante’s Divine Comedy. It started with Heaven moved on to Purgatory and ended up with Hell. I must confess I soon abandoned any desire to make sense why certain pieces were in a section. I just let myself enjoy the process of discovery. I did feel a sense of elation as I walked into the foyer with Ndary Lo’s flying metal figures floating above our heads and approached Abdoulaye Konate’s wall hangings made of textiles, which exuded positive energy. Graceful dancing cutout figures anchored on a deep blue or red carpet-like ground conveyed a sense of joy, grace, and even intimacy.

Jellel Gasteli’s photographs of the desert brought me abruptly down to earth. Here the only evidence of human life were the traces left behind by man, like the print of a boot left on the sand, or the battered road signs. What one was left to see was the vastness of the desert yet seen so intimately that the love of the artist for it was palpable. While absent, man’s presence was intimately felt. Gasteli lives in Tunisia and the desert has been a fixture in his life. Paradise? Perhaps. Make sure you have water though!

I spend a lot of time gazing and walking around Jane Alexander’s tableau “Frontier With Church.” Set in a darkened chamber, what seemed to be a procession was at once intensely disturbing and captivating. There was something ritualistic, almost pagan to the scene. Hybrid creatures, humanimals – hyperrealist human bodies with animal heads – were pulling stacked on top of one another, a large crate wrapped in plastic, a luxurious trunk, and a black and white lamb while other creatures followed the convoy looking out to the crowds.

 

I could not figure out what this sheep was doing on top of the trunk but it brought up memories of images of religious pagan or Christian rituals such as the Golden Ram or the Sacrificial lamb. A Christian religious image glued on the side of the trunk confirmed I was on the right track.

Furthermore, three standing alone creatures were dressed in priestly garb with embroidered crosses and were possibly proselytizing. Every detail seemed significant though what one was meant to read from it was not always evident. Further research helped elucidate the meaning of the tableau. While the artist is making a direct reference to the procession encountered by Dante and Matilda at the Summit of Mount Purgatory she is highlighting the connection to proselytizism, migration and trade. Jane Alexander who is South African and works and teaches in Cape Town is unusual as she rarely sells her work and prefers to not explain her installations leaving the viewer work things out which is just what we were doing.

The Divine Comedy and its three states with its Christian undertones inspired further reflections on the role of religion. Zoulikha Bouabdellah installation “Silence” juxtaposed the two worlds of the sacred and the profane and paid tribute to those women who are not afraid to assert themselves despite the restrictions dictated by their faith. A series of identical prayer mats were cut out in the middle creating a space where golden shoes were positioned. The grid like effect created by the serial arrangements of the mats conveyed to me Islam’s rigid framework while the golden pumps evoked the fantasies of Westernization.

Life has a strange way of testing us. Recently this installation was included in an exhibition in Clichy, a close suburb of Paris. The artist and the curator chose to remove it after the Charlie Hebdo killings. It appears that the “mairie” had been warned by the local Muslim community that that there was a risk of violence. Feeling that the piece would not lead to the kind of dialogue that she wished to foster and getting no support from the local mayor Zoulikha Bouabdellah withdrew the piece although she felt strongly that there was nothing blasphemous about the work. By the way this work was produced in 2007/2008 and has been seen many times in Europe. I can’t help feeling deeply worried when I see the gradual erosion of civil rights as a result of threats of violence. This did not hit the front page of the papers but it is deeply concerning.

Looking back I realized how many of the works that struck me were done by women artists. Their work felt strongly convincing and aesthetically appealing. Their message was conveyed at times with the simplest of means.

Myriam Mihindou’s compelling and disturbing video “The Dress Flew Off” offered a poignant and poetic window into the artist’s torment. It was fantastic! The video zeros in on the artist’s legs and I found myself watching with increasing emotion as her hands struggled with her sheer skin-colored tights – a metaphor for her skin and /or social self. She pulls, stretches, tears the tights, covering and uncovering her calves while speaking of her body, skin, and pain. It is as if she is molting and the viewer becomes the witness of the birth of her “second skin.” Watching her struggle with being a woman of mixed race restricted by the taboos of race became a visceral experience. The simplicity of the performance and of the choice of elements and the power of expression was what impressed me so much.

The photographic work of Kiluaniji Kia Henda was very seductive and I found myself pondering my reaction. Hinda creates an unsettling and provocative visual and political relationship between the naked shape of a black man and the rich brown architectural details of an interior setting dating back to the 18/19th century. In one instance the body lies on the table as an anonymous shape.

It is just another unidentified object as all the chairs and tables carefully placed in the room. In another photograph the man is naked and sits between two scantily clad caryatids that are supporting the mantel. Here the artist links the economic fortunes of old Portugal to the exploitation of Africa and in particular to the slave trade. Absorbed with the aesthetic experience it took me awhile to realize that the artist was purposefully objectifying the black body to illustrate his point. Through fiction and careful staging of the photographs Hinda points to the historical and contemporary fraught presence of Africa in Europe while highlighting the artificiality of historical truth.

Nandipha Mntambo’s cowhide sculptures had plenty of breathing room, while Nicholas Hlobo ‘s gargantuan sprawling sculpture seemed a little squeezed in the long back gallery.

 

 

 

Tucked away behind Joel Andrianomearisoa’s installation of hinged vanity mirrors I was pleased to finally see Aida Muluneh haunting photographs. However they deserved better exposure. Beautifully composed, uncompromising, and enigmatic, I had a sense that what was being referenced here was dire and deeply personal. Muluneh, an Ethiopian photojournalist by training, forgoes simply documenting victimization and misery (Hell). Instead, through a carefully constructed, stylized and contemporary image integrating tradition and contemporary aesthetics she chooses to point to the burden of a painful history while not eschewing all responsibility.

 

 

Muluneh describes her creative thinking while making this photographic series:

“I painted her body white because for me, living in this city that we call Adis Ababa, we don’t need to fantasize about going to the Inferno – I have seen and experienced things that really make me question humanity. I have realized that in order to get ahead here, many people wear masks in order to protect their future. But while doing this, the reality is that I have seen the various atrocities and the great length that many will go to in order to maintain their success. So with that in mind, for me the red hands symbolize the guilt associated with the thirst for upward mobility. The cloth wrapped around Salem’s body is specifically from the southern region of Ethiopia, which has endured centuries of oppression, slavery, and so forth. For the background colour, I chose the off-grey because it reminds me of a dirty snow; this reminds me of my childhood of growing up in Canada, in the midst of the bitter cold, and also the challenges that I faced being an African immigrant in an all-white community.”

This exhibition gathered works that for the most part felt deeply relevant to our times while being wonderfully creative and personal. It will be shown at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art in Washington DC starting April 8.