Jepchumba African Digital Art Digital Colonialism Erasure and Digital Memory

'Exotic Trade' is Tabita Rezaire's kickoff solo exhibition in which she deploys 'digital healing activism' every bit a strategy to envision decolonial technologies through which nosotros can 'holistically connect to ourselves, to one another, to the earth and to the multiverse' (Rezaire). 'Exotic Trade' is on show at the Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg from 8 April to 17 May 2017.

Tabita Rezaire, Dilo, 2017. Lightbox. Image courtesy of the Goodman Gallery.

The Internet is exploitative, exclusionary, classist, patriarchal, racist, homophobic, transphobic, fatphobic, coercive and manipulative. We need to decolonise and heal our technologies. Healing is resistance. – Tabita Rezaire

Exotic Trade is Tabita Rezaire'due south beginning solo exhibition in which she deploys 'digital healing activism' every bit a strategy to envision decolonial technologies through which nosotros tin 'holistically connect to ourselves, to ane another, to the earth and to the multiverse' (Rezaire).

This otherworldly exhibition digs into the histories, politics and memories of data and communication technologies (ICT), exposing the violence and erasure carried by our current networks and unearthing possibilities for spiritual technologies.
Through video installations and digital prints, the artist responds to a perceived demand to reconnect body, 'womb-mind' and spirit to heal the 'oppressive colonial hierarchies of knowledge systems which define the dominant narratives of our time' (Rezaire).

Tabita Rezaire, Hoetep Blessings (still), 2016. Hard disk drive Video, 12 min 30s. Commissioned by Bradford Nordeen for Summer happenings, The Wide Museum, LA, Us.

Exotic Trade explores 'alternative' ways of receiving, creating and sharing information through spiritual interfaces by accessing what Rezaire terms the 'cosmos database' – from communicating with ancestors to embracing water, the womb and teacher plants every bit 'primal-portals' for 'downloading' noesis.

In the prove, Rezaire draws parallels between the layout of submarine optic cables (the very compages of the Internet) and colonial merchandise routes to betoken to the powerful symbolism underpinning 'electronic colonialism' whereby the Internet has literally been built on routes of Black pain.

For Rezaire, 'the irony is that the engineering science of the Internet would not exist without the influence of African spiritualities because the origin of computing scientific discipline has, in fact, been traced back to African divination systems'. Rezaire uses screen interfaces inside her practice to remember the 'infinite-time' where technology, the biosphere and the spiritual world connect.

Tabita Rezaire, Deep Down Tidal (still), 2017. Hd video, 19min. Commissioned past Toke Lykkeberg for Citizen X – Human, Nature, And Robot Rights, Oregaard Museum, Denmark.

Exotic Trade volition be arranged in the shape of a womb to create a 'nurturing infinite that connects us to the source', says the artist. This composition relates to the intention backside key pieces, which celebrate the resilience of Black womxn in the face of colonialist and capitalist exploitation. Rezaire seeks to mark the contribution of Black womxn to the advancement of medical science and technology – often unwillingly and painfully, such as with gynaecology – and confront the erasure of Blackness womxn from the ascendant narrative of technological achievement.

Rezaire grapples with inherited traumas that brunt Blackness womxn'south 'soul-bodies' and re-construes Black, femme erotic power as a creative and transformative free energy. Her mission is 'to reimagine a politics of pleasure driven by unapologetic desire, spiritual awakening, dearest and compassion' (Rezaire).

By undertaking a dedicated excavation of the healing potential of forgotten technologies and asserting their relevance to our present age – a procedure that Rezaire calls 'network archaeology' – Exotic Trade advocates for the possibility of nurturing a 'mind-trunk-spirit-techno consciousness' that counters our current state of disconnection.

Rezaire's solo bear witness comes at a time of increasing global interest in her work and in digital art from Africa and its Diaspora. Her 2017 programme includes two museum commissions by Oregaard Museum in Hellerup, Denmark, and NRW-FORUM in Düsseldorf; exhibitions at House of Electronic Arts Basel in Basel, the KNOCKDOWN Middle in New York, and Impakt festival in Utrecht, among others. Her creative person group NTU will present solo shows at Auto Italian republic South E in London and LUMA Westbau in Zurich. Rezaire has a serial of talks and performances scheduled in Southward Africa, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria, and the U.s.. In June, she volition begin an artist residency at Meetfactory in Prague.

Tabita Rezaire, Deep Down Tidal (still), 2017. Hd video, 19 min. Commissioned by Toke Lykkeberg for Denizen Ten – Human, Nature, And Robot Rights, Oregaard Museum, Kingdom of denmark.

Tabita Rezaire is a French born Guyanese / Danish new media artist whose work explores 'decolonial health and knowledge' through the politics of technology. By navigating architectures of power online and offline, her work tackles the pervasive matrix of coloniality and its furnishings on identity, applied science, sexuality and spirituality. In 2016, Rezaire's piece of work was featured on exhibitions at the 9th Berlin Biennale; The Wide, LA; The Museum of Modern Art, Paris; and the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA), New York. She lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Exotic Trade is love is anger is hurting is healing on screens
Exotic Trade is hardrive retention is forgotten memory is unearthed potential
Exotic Trade is a diagnosis is a remedy is caring
Exotic Trade is trying
Exotic Trade is for you is for us
Exotic Trade is harnessing the power of vibration
Exotic Merchandise is sharing fluids of survival
Exotic Trade is wet and juicy honey
Exotic Merchandise is contradiction is complicity exposed
Exotic Trade is struggling with self-love
Exotic Trade is cocky-commodification is self-realisation is self-doubt
Exotic Trade is me for sell
 – Tabita Rezaire

tinklenournst.blogspot.com

Source: https://artafricamagazine.org/tabita-rezaier-exotic-trade/

Share this post