The Ethnology of Genocide : the painting series

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The subject matter of my current preoccupation as an artist is painting, the history of painting, and geopolitical history.

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I use oil media, along with others, to comment on the extent of European cultural hegemony on the development and state of African nation-making and cultural heritage. I focus on African artefacts infamously looted by Western colonial powers in the late 20th century. The central narrative becomes the Benin empire and its rich cultural heritage.

 

My paintings, in searching for a way to engage this history in a contemporary-relevant way, set out to create myths and episodes based on the 'facts' of history. The treatment of history in a mythological way enables me to make both fun and political statements in a way open to personal interpretation.

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My work seeks to avoid becoming a preserve of historians and politicians and instead becomes a shared point of engagement between the layman, artist, and historian.

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This is to be found in my choice of colours and the disfiguration of African art motifs. The range of arbitrary colours in these depictions becomes a conceptual turn that aims to open up the subject to modern vibrancy and re-thinking of traditional culture.