Art Never mind the naysayers, those who insist the Bay area is one big cultural wasteland. I was reminded recently of the phenomenal, multilayered cultural experiences available right here in our own back yard, in this case a symposium I attended last month at USF's Marshall Center. Here it is a month later and I'm still savoring the panelists' lively discussion that touched on subjects like long-term colonial oppression in Africa and the post-Apartheid experience. Words like globalization, diaspora, migration, power dynamics and negotiation filtered out to the large crowd, and had I not known better, it would've been easy to think the speakers were addressing political science, economic or social theory or even population demographics.
Not exactly. Or maybe only partially.
The underlying subject was art. And though participants represented various aspects of the arts, the politics of human experience were never far from the discussion.
Sporting a heady title, "Discerning the Diaspora," the symposium, moderated by USF Professor Rozalinda Borcila, was a collaborative event between the university, visiting scholars, artists and graduate students. It was held in conjunction with a USF Contem-porary Art Museum (CAM) exhibition, "The Field's Edge: Africa, Diaspora, Lens," a remarkable small survey of lens-based art from the last 10 years. The artists are all of African or African-related heritage. It's exceptional for several reasons; not just the compelling art, but because it introduces us to authentic images and attitudes by artists whose art speaks for them. Unlike the political art we saw unleashed during the '90s, much of this is powerful but not preachy.
The entire project, two years in the making, was initiated by Amanda Carlson, a former USF professor, Fulbright Scholar, and African studies specialist with a strong interest in African photography, particularly from South Africa. Carlson co-curated the exhibition with Johannesburg-based Rory Bester, an art historian, curator and critic.
The word "diaspora" speaks to the heart of both the symposium and the exhibition. It derives from the Jewish historical experience, though scholars have adapted a wider definition to include voluntary migration or the forced dispersion of any cultural group. Within South Africa, the notion of separation has lasting scars. The Apartheid-era practice of white minorities restricting blacks from entering particular areas without passbooks listing their employers names was a "project of spatial reengineering," Bester says.
Along with recent developments in photography, the exhibition also focuses on themes related to the notion of domesticity. Carlson reports that this relates to "power dynamics with a history of foreigners curating for Western audiences." We see this in a borrowed Smithsonian archival collection of 19 historical postcards (1895-1925) where staged false images of the black African's domestic activities have been preserved. Natives are posed in stereotypical Western narratives rather than as authentic individuals. Memorialized in postcard form, such historically inaccurate imagery remains the subject of sensitive debate.
Despite their politically charged nature, the postcards are beautifully displayed in the museum lobby — like false trophies, each visible within wall-mounted Plexiglas holders. Though not officially part of "The Field's Edge" exhibition, they're projected on a few walls, one high, and one close to the floor. In Brechtian fashion, these oddly placed lifelike projections disrupt the exhibition narrative and cause the viewer to question the relationship of artificial images with those produced by the artists. (Brecht's "disruption" factor was designed to divert attention away from a play's logical narrative).
The lobby also houses an installation called "Profile," the work of Bernie Searle of Cape Town, South Africa, an artist gaining international prominence whose art you will not easily forget. Recently awarded a prestigious international prize, she is a phenomenal artist with an equally phenomenal and diverse heritage (black and white, European and Middle Eastern, Muslim and Catholic, European-African and South African-African). It's no surprise that her focus is personal identity.
"Profile," with eight large digital prints, hangs from the ceiling, confronting the viewer with in-your-face profiles of the artist, each with a scar-like impression on her cheek. Although they appear to be real indentations, they're actually temporary markings made by symbolic icons. Each tells a story and refers to emotional scars from South Africa's painful history. A Dutch windmill and cloves, for example, symbolize the Dutch East India Company's 17th century spice trading, which led to the European colonization of Cape Town.
Even more stirring is Searle's "Still," installed in the back of the East Gallery. Eight digitally printed nude self-portraits show the artist performing rituals. On the floor, an area of flour residue remains where Searle performed a ritual before the opening night reception. As a group, the images are eerie and marvelous, like time stilled and transformed, as if the figure was an ancient ancestral person captured with the lens. That they were taken by a 21st century artist almost seems intrusive. Searle's "Snow White," a video with the same images, is not in the show. For fans of Bill Viola, her images are reminiscent of his "Crossings," though his figure is far less up close and personal.
Thembinkosi Goniwe's work appears more aggressively ritualistic than Searle's. The young, versatile artist, also from Cape Town, is currently pursing a Ph.D. in art history at Cornell University. Like Searle, he's particularly interested in African rituals. He studies their influence on contemporary existence or on the viewer, and the influence of Western culture on ritual practice. His digital inkjet prints reveal the South African Xhosa male circumcision ritual called "ulwaluko." Placing these images in the back hallway along with Goniwe's video is extremely effective. This artificially created, psychologically claustrophobic environment leaves no way out; thus viewers have no choice but to confront and engage in the ritual experience.
Another artist to follow is Nigerian-born Fatimah Tuggar, recently awarded an MFA from Yale University. Her large inkjet prints, boldly striking technicolor composites of clashing cultures, include "Iyali" ("Family"), 48-by-67 inches, with a picture-perfect African family posing in a Western-style living room. Over the couch and behind the couple is a double portrait (the image and its reverse) of the old Leave it to Beaver family. Tuggar's double imagery is presumably intended to emphasize ongoing themes of hybrid cultures. I like the way she injects a subtle sense of play into compositions with weighty content.
Large, digitally manipulated photographs titled "Authentic African" are one of two entries by Nigerian-born, American-educated Odili Donald Odita, who was also one of the symposium panelists. His four self-portraits depict the artist as a young man, exploring identity, power and diaspora, by posing in a variety of clothing. How should he dress and who should he be? We see him in African garb, a business suit, the policeman's uniform and casual jeans, but his expression portrays questioning more than personal conviction.
What makes these especially interesting is that we are viewing an age-old psychological drama that crosses all boundaries and ethnicities. In the end, perhaps it's the huge white background behind each of the figures that injects the powerful subtext of color. Currently a USF visiting professor, Odita is also a multimedia artist, curator and writer.
Two artists deal directly with social issues and injustice.
South African filmmaker Teboho Mahlatsi's short film, "Portrait of a Young Man Drowning," won a Venice Film Festival Silver Lion Award. It responds to the artist's conviction that individuals need recognition, not always the groups or mobs which deny individuality. Colin Richards, a white South African art critic and curator, is represented by an eight-part wall installation revealing factual evidence of the final tragic days of Steven Biko, leader of South Africa's Black Consciousness movement.
Symposium speaker Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, of Afro-Cuban descent, is represented by an installation with multiple video projection. Her nostalgic themes include sweet memories and sounds of childhood. The work of two important African American female artists, Lorna Simpson and Carrie Mae Weems, lends an established cachet to the collection of art here that is mostly unfamiliar to our Western eye.
Do not miss this exhibition, and not only because of the art. I'm thinking of post-9/11 negative attitudes toward America, and the ways in which they've shocked us and shattered our old habits of complacency. To put it bluntly, understanding all festering forms of global oppression, past or present, are critical survival skills for each of us. This kind of exhibition, designed to acquaint us with lens-based work from artists with roots on the other side of the globe, also brings their world much closer to ours.
And what was it I said at the outset? I'll say it again. Forget about the naysayers. Culture is alive and well right here in our own back yard.
Contact art critic Adrienne Golub at randagolub@aol.com
This article appears in Nov 27 – Dec 3, 2002.