ART
ADDRESSES ISSUES OF SEXUALITY AND GENDER IDENTITY
By
Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted October 28, 2017)
When sex and
nudity are on public display, they’re likely to arouse strong sentiments, either
focused interest or fervent outrage, depending on the perspective of the
viewer.
The subjects
of sex and nudity become even more disturbing or delicious, troubling or
tantalizing when they’re framed in the field of fine art.
Artists like
Michael Soi, Patrick Mukabi and John Kamicha all have been challenged for
daring to address such themes in their art.
Whether the
artists taking part in the current group show at Goethe Institute receive
insults or applause for their feminist artistry, only time will tell.
But from the
outpouring of appreciation that they received at the opening last Wednesday
night, the show, entitled ‘Remote’, already looks like it’s a watershed of an
exhibition.
It’s only
the show’s title, ‘Remote’, that seems curious since the art of both Maral
Bolouri and Asteria Malinzi are all about intimacy, immediacy and outspoken
truth-telling.
Jackie
Karuti’s imaginative and whimsical video might work, given ‘The Planets Chapter
32’ takes us into the far (‘remote’) reaches of the universe. The trip is
powered by the artist’s curiosity and the paper kite cum rocket ship that
fancifully flies her into outer space.
Only the ‘Troglodyte’
images of Joshua Obaga reflect the sort of alienation, isolation and
frustration that yearns to break out of those feelings and re-connect with the
living.
But if the
title is curious, the concept that curator Zihan Herr has sought to explore is
challenging and deep. She wanted her fellow artists to explore concepts associated
with dismantling ‘social constructs’, be they limiting social stereotypes or false
historical narratives.
Both Maral
and Asteria took up the challenge and defiantly employed their artistic methods
to dispense with outmoded, inaccurate and dehumanizing social constructs.
In Maral’s
case, her multimedia installation draws upon the same research into African
proverbs that fueled her award-winning ‘L’Atelier’ piece entitled ‘Mothers and
Others’.
The
installation comes in four parts. First, there’s a white open box which seems
to serve as a trash bin since it’s filled with paper scraps with ugly
anti-woman stereotypes written on them. Terms like ‘slut’, ‘whore’, ‘loose’ and
‘pussy’ all were implied in the traditional proverbs; but these are dispensed
with by the artist.(nothing more than garbage to the artist).
Going
further, Maral boldly draws a black and white set of nine almond-shaped figures.
They’re delicately drawn and anatomically, they look exactly like ladies’
primary sexual organ, the clitoris.
She also
creates a series of the clit-shaped organ in clay which she’s painted white, as
if to underscore its importance to women’s sexual identity and pleasure.
Maral
creates one last set of images, one clitoris in the center, one a sharply
pointed hook apparently representing the sharp pain that women feel when
violated sexually, and one knotted noose sliced open, perhaps a symbol of
freedom.
Her art is
incredibly powerful as she seems to be declaring both women’s defiance of the
stereotypes and her new, uninhibited and bold gender identity which transcends
the old and starts afresh to develop new identities and art.
Finally,
Asteria’s main medium is photography which she uses to deconstruct the old
narrative about slavery and the horror of Africans’ middle passage into
dehumanizing servitude. That historical narrative is normally either sanitized
or ignored entirely. But Asteria aims to both set the narrative straight and
expose the cruelty inflicted on African women. She does so both with a written
text and a beautiful full-bodied portrait of a woman. The woman is nude,
apparently representing African women’s stark situation both during the Middle
Passage and on the slave auction block.
Coincidentally,
the nude is also the artist who stands without shame, much as African women had
to stand while being dehumanized and treated like objects and animals up for
sale.
There’s
nothing pornographic about the nude. Neither is there any disfiguration to
detract from the beauty of this body.
One cannot
predict how long it will be before fundamentalists come to Goethe and protest either
the nude who stands near the entrance to the show, or the flagrant display of
not just one but ten unmistakably images of women’s ultra-sensitive sexual
organ.
The subtle symbolism
of Zihan’s show may be lost to those who only look superficially at the art.
Its meaning may remain ‘remote’ to general audiences. But it’s also provocative
and bound to rouse curiosity and whatever else.
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