Gallery Tiwani Contemporary hosts “In the Blood”, a group show featuring nine contemporary African artists exploring painting as a medium of expression. Running until September 14, 2024, these creators offer an innovative vision of art by reinterpreting life and emotions through a deft fusion of abstraction and figuration, captivating visitors with their depth and spontaneity.
Featuring artists such as Amanda Mushate, Claude Lawrence, Emma Prempeh, Heloisa Hariadne, Joy Labinjo, Miranda Forrester, Rita Alaoui, Tessa Mars and Virginia Chihota, the works presented at “In the Blood” are an ode to creativity and artistic diversity. Amanda Mushate, in particular, unveils pieces such as Ramangwana mukutamba [Future at stake] , Ukuthandana [Loving one another] and Izifiso [Wishes] , all dating from 2023. Through a resolutely abstract artistic approach, she raises questions about her own existence, overcoming the challenges of life as a woman and mother evolving in an artistic universe marked by Zimbabwe’s male dominance.
Opting for ubuntu as a source of inspiration, an African philosophical concept celebrating interdependence and solidarity, Amanda Mushate infuses her works with profound humanity and introspective reflection. Her canvases seem to offer meandering paths where viewers are invited to share their questions, emotions and experiences. Amanda Mushate’s art thus reveals itself as a journey without beginning or end, in which she sensitively expresses her innermost tensions, joys and aspirations.
At the heart of the lower gallery, Claude Lawrence deploys his art with captivating mastery, blending various immersive elements to create an all-encompassing artistic experience. Inspired by the spirit of improvisation and abstraction, the artist explores the nuances of jazz and abstract expressionism through his work, offering dynamic interpretations of movement, listening, memories and experiences. Emphasizing the power of her creation with a vibrant color palette and striking forms, drawn from her travels between the USA and France, her work Untitled (2021) takes on its full dimension within the “In the Blood” exhibition.
Emma Prempeh reveals her artistic genius through the symbolism of a portrait, offering the public an introspective look imbued with sensitivity. In her work Solitude (2022), the artist captures the figure of her friend with emotional depth, highlighting a poetic reflection on the passage of time and memory. Across a dark interior, where every detail is carefully arranged, Emma Prempeh’s friend sits perfectly dressed in sunglasses, enveloped in a delicate light that subtly reveals the various elements that make up the canvas, such as a clock and the recurring motif of the carpet from the artist’s grandmother’s house. All these elements, evoking both the past and the future in a spellbinding visual harmony.
Immersing visitors in an intimate, introspective atmosphere, Heloisa Hariadne’s works share emotional and philosophical landscapes rich in experience and reflection. Her bold medium- and large-scale paintings skilfully combine representations of herself and her thoughts, creating a fantastical, meditative botanical space. Her art offers a true spiritual retreat, inviting contemplation, stillness and movement, while encouraging deep and meaningful connections. The singularity of her work is fully realized in her work presented at the exhibition entitled Pétalas que choraram sem conseguir respirar nos céus em busca de vida (Petals that cried without being able to breathe in the sky in search of life) dating from 2023.
Joy Labinjo celebrates the richness of existence through her predominantly figurative works, exploring in innovative ways the genre of portraiture and the meanings it holds about community, society and history. Using vernacular photographs, archival images and iconographic elements as starting points, Joy Labinjo constructs a captivating pictorial universe. Each of her canvases conveys deep emotions, subtle comments and even responses that are both personal and universally cultural. The exhibition highlights her work Sandcastle (2023), emblematic of a period when the artist drew her inspiration from the need for conviviality and intimacy.
As part of “In the Blood”, Miranda Forrester invites the public to immerse themselves in her gestural artistic style, a cross between drawing and painting. Her work Leda and Nemesis’ Children (2023) offers an artistic meditation on the transition to new parenthood, and reinterprets the Greek myth of Leda and the swan. Miranda Forrester finely captures intimate moments of daily life and the body, illustrating a profound reflection on the evolution of identity. At times, her compositions incorporate queer cultural and historical elements, as photographic transfers juxtaposed on canvas, polyethylene or polycarbonate. Suggested nudity and plays on transparency reveal her sincere desire to freely share her perspective as a queer woman of color, fully embracing her experiences and unique vision of art and life.
Rita Alaoui shares with the public her contemplative moments on the relationship between man and nature through her work Autumn #13 (2023). This painting is part of a developing series aimed at freezing time to magnify nature, in full bloom with less human involvement. Her diligent research and multiple portraits of carefully selected plants enrich her knowledge of their origins, particularities and medicinal virtues, deepening her links with her environment in France, her explorations in other lands, and her roots in Morocco, through her maternal line.
Tessa Mars creates imaginative mythologies to probe her own Haitian identity and visions of the land and ancestors through the prism of time and space. In her work, The Water Is Waiting For Us To Water Too, the artist’s family representations seem suspended between immobility and movement, captured in an enigmatic expanse of water. Haiti, like other Caribbean nations, is feeling the effects of rising sea levels due to the climate emergency. Through her paintings, Tessa Mars raises an evocative question about the advancing waters: are the island and its inhabitants ready, metaphorically and concretely, to face the rising tide together?
In a premature transition from painting to printmaking, Virginia Chihota is featured in the upper section of the gallery. Specializing in silkscreen, her transitional artistic process replaces mass production with a limited series of one-off works sharing selected iconography and reflections, personalized through related pieces. His compositions move from drawings to silkscreen stencils, where colored inks are applied to paper or linen surfaces that overlap and evolve over time to completion. A narrative of recurring actions, thoughts and efforts constructs a dense, immersive imagery, offering a journey around a central question or important subject explored by Virginia Chihota. For the “In the Blood” exhibition, the contemporary artist presents the following works: “Munzvimbo yaunofamba nekudzoka wega I [in the space where you walk and come back alone I]” (2022) and “Imomo murudo ndakapidiguka ndinzwisise [in this love I had to overturn to understand]” (2022).
The “In the Blood” exhibition is a varied artistic exploration of a unique creative process. Contemporary artists examine the links between humanity, nature and cultural heritage, and their work transcends the conventional boundaries of art to offer visual narratives rich in meaning and emotion, inviting the public to contemplate and reflect on the complexities of our ever-changing world.
