| ‘Unevenness’ tackles on globalisation |
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| Saturday, 09 June 2012 16:57 |
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By engaging artists who make a substantial amount of work that interrogate issues from both pre-colonial and post-colonial eras, the “Unevenness” exhibition, currently running at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe provides an insight into the power wars currently taking place all over the globe.
The exhibition further challenges the pre-conceived ideas about the minority cultures in African, Asian and Latin American cultures, versus the dominant cultures. Ronald Berry Thomas’ “But It’s Mine”, a painting, which is oil on canvas, portrays a despondent unemployed young man who is pondering his bleak future while only a distance away an excavator gets to work on an open mine cast project. As the relationship between certain cultures and histories remains wary and uneven, the show is a platform for artists from all communities to show their different views on the topic. Through this display, artists critically question the nature of the relationships constructed from the interaction of histories and religions across the world. They also aim to contribute to the current dialogue about globalisation and how widespread the attendant benefits for different people are. A Malian writer, Amadou Hampâté Bâ, said there should be a constant reminder about our differences when he said, “. . . it is not because a chameleon changes colours that it is a hypocrite, it is because nature hates uniformity”. In Mudi Yaya’s video Conrad’s “Circus Trilogy Chapter III”, Black Africans are portrayed in a caricature style. The cartoon installation strikingly portrays an unevenness of the African figure, with features such as dark skin, fat lips and possessing peculiar behavioural characteristics. Samba Fall’s video titled “Yesterday I Had a Dream” explains how the economies of the world have propelled capitalism, which has robbed the majority working class of their financial independence. More so, the global economic crunch and personal greed have led to debt and poverty in many countries. Karuva, Tafadzwa Gwetai, Israel Israel, Dominic Benhura, Stanford Derere, Norbert Shamuyarira, Arthur Fata, Voti Thebe, Portia Zvavahera, Semina Mpofu, Lin Berrie, Rudo Zijena and Taylor Nkomo, from South Africa, Themba Shibase, Mohau Modisakeng, Mitchelle Mathison and Breeze Yoko, from Senegal/Norway there is Samba Fall, Simon Leigh from the USA, Jelili Atiku from Nigeria, Bushra Junaid from Canada and Jason Parr from the UK, among others.
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