PERFORMANCES
IFA, 2021
This new series is informed by Bam’s ongoing journey into the Yoruba culture of her native Nigeria. Manifested in sculpture, performance, video, and installation, Bam approaches traditions of making as an antidote for violence. For Bam the semiotic aspects of the feminine (intimacy, care, vulnerability, the vessel) are vital in considering how a relationship to nature can break down ideological structures.
There is an increasing amount of discourse today around what it means to be an African in globalised capitals. How do we, in the neo-liberal West, engage with pluralities of past, present and future African identity? Bam’s work is an intimate form of this social exploration. Clay holds narrative and curative powers. It is maleable, fragile, erotic; clay remembers. Bam approaches the material for solace, for respite, for liberation. She embraces it, fulfilling a desire for intimacy and symbiosis - the Dutch word Huidhonger is the best descriptor she can conjure for the feeling. It means skin hunger: the feeling people develop when they are disconnected from one another.
In titling the sculptures Ifa, Bam signals their multiplicities. Ifa in Yoruba means both (ifá): divination and (Ìfá): to draw close. Maybe they are votive objects bringing one closer to the divine. As viewers, we are turned into witnesses to the performance of a ritual that has the artist transforming - a newfound willingness to share her intimate space - unadorned, raw, in process. She strips away color, controlled form, and loneliness. It’s a very African act to invite us into the commune; but, it’s a universal act to invite us to be a community.
WORDS BY RAPHAEL GUILBERT
Osun Osogbo Sacred grove
In Hearthland
Performance for camera
In Hearthland (1)
Performance series
In Hearthland (2)
Performance series
CATHARSIS,
Harare, 2018
Catharsis (n) an experience of emotional release and purification, often inspired by or through art. In psychoanalysis, Catharsis is the release of tension and anxiety that results from bringing repressed feelings and memories into consciousness.
This durational performance acts as both a personal and collective purification ritual, with the artist acting as agent for the audience. Clay stands in as a metaphorical vessel representing the primordial etheric body. Water is the ultimate symbol for purification. At the point of Catharsis, when the artist’s arms tire, the vessel is dropped and breaks, spilling its contents.
PERFORMANCES
IFA, 2021
This new series is informed by Bam’s ongoing journey into the Yoruba culture of her native Nigeria. Manifested in sculpture, performance, video, and installation, Bam approaches traditions of making as an antidote for violence. For Bam the semiotic aspects of the feminine (intimacy, care, vulnerability, the vessel) are vital in considering how a relationship to nature can break down ideological structures.
There is an increasing amount of discourse today around what it means to be an African in globalised capitals. How do we, in the neo-liberal West, engage with pluralities of past, present and future African identity? Bam’s work is an intimate form of this social exploration. Clay holds narrative and curative powers. It is maleable, fragile, erotic; clay remembers. Bam approaches the material for solace, for respite, for liberation. She embraces it, fulfilling a desire for intimacy and symbiosis - the Dutch word Huidhonger is the best descriptor she can conjure for the feeling. It means skin hunger: the feeling people develop when they are disconnected from one another.
In titling the sculptures Ifa, Bam signals their multiplicities. Ifa in Yoruba means both (ifá): divination and (Ìfá): to draw close. Maybe they are votive objects bringing one closer to the divine. As viewers, we are turned into witnesses to the performance of a ritual that has the artist transforming - a newfound willingness to share her intimate space - unadorned, raw, in process. She strips away color, controlled form, and loneliness. It’s a very African act to invite us into the commune; but, it’s a universal act to invite us to be a community.
WORDS BY RAPHAEL GUILBERT
Osun Osogbo Sacred grove
In Hearthland (1)
Performance series
In Hearthland (2)
Performance series
In Hearthland
Performance for camera
CATHARSIS,
Harare, 2018
Catharsis (n) an experience of emotional release and purification, often inspired by or through art. In psychoanalysis, Catharsis is the release of tension and anxiety that results from bringing repressed feelings and memories into consciousness.
This durational performance acts as both a personal and collective purification ritual, with the artist acting as agent for the audience. Clay stands in as a metaphorical vessel representing the primordial etheric body. Water is the ultimate symbol for purification. At the point of Catharsis, when the artist’s arms tire, the vessel is dropped and breaks, spilling its contents.
