Yinka Shonibare

Yinka Shonibare (born 9 August 1962) is a British artist whose work explores cultural identity, colonialism and post-colonialism within the contemporary context of globalisation. Quotes I didn't understand why I was meant to produce 'authentic' African art. I don't disregard tradition, but should an English person make work about Morris dancing? Artists make works based on what they're seeing and what people are talking about at the time. I found myself in the middle of all this. There was all this excitement. And because you didn’t have property, because you didn’t have money, you didn’t much care. We just took over spaces and did incredible things. Do I love the establishment or do I hate the establishment? I thought I was a republican, but then I was invited to Buckingham Palace; I actually liked being there. I was fascinated by everything. There’s some kind of fascination with monarchy, a sort of a romance of it. After all, I am an artist, so I like all that pomp and all that ceremony. I like the costumes as well, so there’s a natural wanting to challenge the establishment, and I don’t approve, but there’s also that thing of imagining having all of that. We all have a fascination with power, and cyclically we’d all like to have that power ourselves. Unfortunately, most revolutionaries become dictators. It’s a balance, it’s about understanding there’s a flip side. I don’t take the perspective of being a victim. I don’t want to have this ‘Here’s someone of African origin, and his position is always to protest against the establishment’. I’m for and against at the same time, and people can draw their own conclusions. Charles Saatchi bought my work. And I found myself shown at the Royal Academy, and I found myself with a Mayfair gallery, and it's kind of ironic, because what you are doing is you're biting the hand that feeds you, and you'd be a rebel, and you'd be getting all these awards, so they're saying 'Good on you, good naughtiness'. I want to change the way that history represents me. The whole thing started as a joke about the French revolution. I was a sort of angry young man at that time. Obviously I couldn’t behead people, so I could do it to mannequins. I could dress them very nicely and then take their heads off. I think that I’ve been in a fortunate, or maybe unfortunate position, where I am descended from Yoruba aristocracy, which is a Nigerian aristocracy. And some of my ancestors were involved in the trading of slaves. People think that Africa was not involved in the trade, but there were quite a number of Africans who were very much involved. It doesn’t matter who’s doing it. It’s terrible. In my case, it’s not actually been harmful to me, my difference. It’s been very productive. It’s good to know your identity, to have your identity be physical. People have to be prepared to learn from you, and you from them. Cultural difference is about education. I still paint and I draw. You have to be extremely careful not to fall into a trap. Because you don’t want to be like the people who oppressed you. You have to be broadminded enough to realise that contemporary descendants of the people who oppressed you are not the people who oppressed you. I’m not suggesting amnesia, I’m suggesting that you do have to have perspective. It’s art, it’s not some kind of political propaganda. Yinka Shonibare: ‘I thought I was a republican until I went to Buckingham Palace’-THE IRISH TIMES (12 May 2016) I was born in London, and when I moved back to London from Nigeria I realised that, if you are a Black person, there are always questions about your identity. So, I was making work abut global issues, and I felt that I was entitled to make work about anything and one of my tutors said to me, ‘Well you’re of African origin aren’t you? Why aren’t you producing authentic African art? It’s somewhat essentialist to put people in singular boxes, and I’m afraid that is actually the origin of fascism - when you essentialise and put people in fixed boxes.I went to Brixton market and started asking them about the fabrics in the fabric shop. I had imagined the fabrics were ‘authentic African textiles’, I didn’t realise the fabrics were [originally] Indonesian inspired fabrics produced by the Dutch and then sold to the West African markets. But the fabrics are now made in Africa and in China, so I found the colonial origins very interesting, the relationship between Indonesia and Holland, and so the fabrics became a metaphor for the relationship between Africa and Europe. And, of course, these fabrics became a sign of African empowerment and independence, and that Africans have taken on the fabrics and made the fabrics their own. We live fluid lives and we have varied experiences. And after all the nation state is a relatively modern phenomenon. So, I don’t subscribe to the idea of the notion of pure blood. I think that we have to embrace that hybridity and accept the fact that we live in a society where most of our identities are hyphenated identities – British-Nigerian, Italian-American and so on. David Oluwale was a man who came from Nigeria, and he travelled in the 1940s. He subsequently ended up in jail because of the way he came to the UK, stowed away on a ship. When he left jail, he did various odd jobs and unfortunately ended up in contact with the police, and was abused and ended up in jail again. He then developed mental health problems, and he was homeless after he left hospital. He had been in hospital for several years, and he was constantly taunted and harassed by the police until he was eventually, and unfortunately, beaten up and his body was found in the River Aire. It was a terrible thing that happened to him, but most of it happened because of his race. And that was the really shocking thing. When I was asked to make a memorial to him, I felt honoured to be asked to do that. I also see David Oluwale as a symbol of social justice, so it was not just a man that was bullied and killed, I saw him as a lesson for us to make the world a better place. It’s a huge responsibility, one which I don’t underestimate, and I take very seriously. But at the same time I don’t want to produce something that is divisive. I want to produce something that will bring people together, and I think we can find ways to right the wrongs of the past. I hope it’s a meeting point of imagination, reconciliation and a place to foster peace. Yinka Shonibare in conversation with Emily Zobel Marshall: identity, history and honouring the legacy of David Oluwale- Leeds Beckett University (15 October 2021) After Matisse showed Picasso African art for the first time,it changed the history of modern art. When I looked deeper, I saw Picasso was genuinely fascinated by the spiritual power of these objects – it wasn’t just decoration. He went for sculptures that were frightening: half-animal, half-human. I’m not one of these people who challenge cultural appropriation in that way, Of course, I recognise power issues. I recognise that the dominant culture can misuse something. It is a celebration of the works of my ancestors,But there’s also the irony that a contemporary African encounters this spirituality through the eyes of modernism, through the eyes of western art, because I’m distant from the works of my ancestors – they’re not something I’ve used myself, in rituals or in initiation ceremonies as they did. The west created this hybrid monster which is myself. I think what came after,” says Shonibare, “became more like decoration or fashion. I don’t believe other artists were looking with the same depth. The French were very interested in these cultures,But then there is another side: the exoticisation, the fetishisation. It’s a two-way thing, though. You’ve got Black Lives Matter, people fighting for social justice. Then you have an explosion in the market of black art becoming really fashionable, but not with any distance or critical thought or trying to understand these things in a deeper way. Every young artist is trying to paint like Kerry James Marshall [an acclaimed painter of black American scenes], because that’s where the market is. So is this genuine empowerment for artists of African origin? Is this going to last? Or is this another Harlem renaissance that’s just going to be yesterday’s fashion? Cultural appropriation is a two-way thing’: Yinka Shonibare on Picasso, masks and the fashion for black artists-The Guardian External links Category:Living people Category:Artists from England Category:People from London Category:1962 births