Press. voanews.com
Rachel Rymont
did not plan to spend part of her day inside a dark museum when she came into
the District of Columbia to run errands. However, one look at the National
Museum of African Art’s exhibit, "Senses of Time," and the Baltimore
artist was hooked. The video and film exhibit examines how time is experienced
and produced within the body. The film aspect is a big part of what sets this
exhibit apart from others in the museum.
"It’s a
really different experience than being in a gallery or looking at a
painting," Rymont said. “It kind of forces you to step back and really
co-exist with the piece instead of just glancing at it.”
The exhibit,
co-organized with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, features seven works by
six artists. Though time is the theme that draws all the pieces together, the
content differs wildly from piece to piece.
In "Un
Ballo in Maschera," based on Giuseppe Verdi’s 1859 opera, "A Masked
Ball," dancers twirl across the screen wearing elaborate costumes in old
European styles fashioned from African-esque fabrics. Yinka Shonibare's piece
questions the cyclical nature of time as the king, played by a woman, is
assassinated, only to rise and dance once more.
Contrasting this
colorful spectacle is Moataz Nasr's black-and-white film, "The
Water." Faces appear onscreen framed by a puddle on the ground. Right
before a viewer can make out any details, a foot stomps the image out of
existence.
Art and politics
Rymont
appreciated how the exhibit was political without being preachy. “A lot of time
with political work, there’s a tendency for things to get a bit cold or
didactic, but that didn’t happen in there,” she said. “All of it was very
moving, and it was very human.”
Sammy Baloji’s
“Mémoire” is perhaps the most overtly political piece in the exhibit. Filmed
against a series of abandoned copper mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo,
choreographer and dancer Faustin Linyekula twists his body in an animated
interpretive dance while speeches from some of the country's past and present
leaders play.
The piece
highlights how the present reality has failed to live up to past promises,
expressed in a heartbreaking manner when Linyekula is left screaming “Vive
l'independance” (Long live independence) to nothing but silence.
For Sue
Williamson, who considers herself a human rights activist as well as an artist,
creating "There’s Something I Must Tell You" was all about opening up
channels of intergenerational discourse. In her film, six South African women,
activists during the Mandela generation, tell stories of their hardships to
their granddaughters and other young female relatives.
In a Skype
interview with VOA, Williamson talked about how many people have important
relationships with their grandmothers but don't always ask key questions before
death intervenes: "You just miss the opportunity of really finding out
about her life." Living through
apartheid in South Africa has influenced how Williamson incorporates social
justice into her art.
"We didn’t
even know when apartheid was going to end. So, as artists, there was a very
strong movement in South Africa," Williamson said. "We felt it was
our responsibility to work in whatever way that we could to try to change the
social situation." She said she hopes the film's stories help viewers
understand the universal experiences facing women around the globe.
The human scale
of time
“About to
Forget” takes a more personal approach to the topic of time. In a comment on
its transcendent nature, artist Berni Searle has cut three silhouettes of
family images from red crepe paper, and the images dissolve on-screen as water
surrounds them, resulting in scenes reminiscent of blood flowing through water.
In her second
piece in the exhibit, “A Matter of Time,” Searle walks across a transparent
surface that has been covered in olive oil. Every time she takes a step
forward, her body inevitably slides back down the screen again.
Much like the
famed Aldous Huxley novel it is named after, “Brave New World I” by Theo Eshetu
focuses on the way technology warps the human experience. A TV flashes a
disjointed kaleidoscope of scenes, from cute animals to the Twin Towers, but
the mirrors angled around the TV turn the images into a repeating globe that
captures the viewer as well.
All seven pieces
play simultaneously within the exhibit hall. The effect is a viewing experience
that challenges not only perceptions of time, but what the medium of film can
accomplish.
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