The
“Beauté Congo” exhibit at the Fondation Cartier in Paris has been so successful
that it is extended until 2016. As I
walked through the exhibition, I noticed that most of the human subjects were men-
Congolese politicians, Barak Obama or Muhammed Ali, for example. The occasional woman
was provocatively dressed or a showcasing a car or pregnant with a budding male
writer/artist.
Then I noticed that the artist names on the wall were all male. This
is not unusual, in any part of the world.
According to the Guerrilla
Girls, in 2012 less than 4% of artists in the modern art section of the
Metropolitan Museum of New York were women. But in
2015, in a major art capital like Paris, at an exhibit representing an entire
country and spanning a century, at a venue that according to Cartier’s website,
“distinguishes itself by its curiosity, originality
and heterogeneity,” I hoped for better. In the WSJ, Tobias Grey, says the “show’s scope is
ambitious.” I wish it were ambitious enough to include women.
I asked
a girl working at the museum entrance if there were any women artists in the
exhibit. She nodded no, then as I walked away, she said: “Wait! There is one
downstairs.” I headed there, excited. Finally, towards the end of the
exhibition, I saw the name: Antoinette Lubaki. She was born in 1895. There were
4 works by her, identical in subject and style to the 14 works by her husband
nearby. So, I considered some of these possibilities:
1.
No
woman born in the 20th century, in this country of 77 million
people, ever touched clay or a brush, camera or other artistic tool or attended
an art school or produced anything of artistic value.
2.
The
curatorial team (headed by Andre Magnin), did not make an effort to look for
such a woman. It is noteworthy that of the 11 (mostly white) catalogue contributors,
only two- Nancy Rose Hunt and Dominique Malaquais, are female.
3.
Magnin’s
definition of what constitutes Congolese art is too narrow to include what
women do.
4.
For
any number of reasons (which might include economics, war and societal
expectations), women are discouraged from making art.
Magnin said, “It is my duty to recount…the
adventure that led me to a deep exploration of Congolese art. I had three aspirations with Beauté Congo.
The first…was to share with a Western public the passion that impelled me to
search all over Congo-Zaire for thirty years. My second aspiration was to tell the story of ninety
years of Congolese art which had always been described partially, and was
visually familiar, but only fragmentarily so until now. I want this exhibition to widen people’s perceptions of the country…”
Yet, I
still feel I am being presented a “partial” and “fragmented” story. One interesting
work is a painting whose title translates into “Africa of the Future.”
Here we see a
utopian vision of a modern world- clean, bright, and where women are mostly
invisible. The few women are accompanied by a man, while the men either walk
independently or with their friends, drive cars or spaceships. I counted
approximately 57 men and 9 women. This far exceeds the imbalance in countries
like India and China, which have a preference for sons and where (according to
the Daily Mail) “there are now as many as 120 or 140 boys for every 100 girls
despite a ban on gender-based abortion.”
Art reflects back to us our desires, values and
beliefs, so what is this painting saying?
I would have
liked the Fondation Cartier to address why, of the 350 works shown and of the
40 artists represented, only one is a woman (represented by 4 pieces, or 1.1%
of the total works). I am not even sure
1.1% is statistically relevant. The Guardian refers to this show as the “first
ever retrospective of art from the DRC”, but it would be more appropriate to
clarify for visitors that this is the first ever retrospective of art by MEN
from the DRC. In France, where people love to strike, why haven’t the citizens
of Paris plastered fliers or held signs in front of the Fondation? Why the
blindness and complacency? Of all the reviews I’ve read, only Rachel Donadio in
the New York Times has touched upon this, and brings in a quote by Pascale
Obolo regarding the “neocolonial and paternalistic attitude of Mr. Magnin.” Ms.
Donadio also informs readers about Michele Magema, a successful Congolese
artist who has exhibited internationally, yet wasn’t included in this show. How
did Magnin, “The world’s foremost expert on African art,” (according to The
Guardian) miss her?
Jenny Stevens, also from
The Guardian, interviewed one of the artists in Beauté Congo, Kiripi Katembo.
He shares his thoughts about one of his images: “Women
raise children, look after their husbands, and also go out to work and provide.
Yet men are still seen as the chiefs. When I look at this picture, I think
about all the work women do to serve the economy of Congo and their families,
but they get no respect. They are treated like machines, while men can do what
they like. I also think of my mother, who died last year. She worked in the
market, ran her own business, knitted and worked out in the fields, too. So I
called this image Move Forward as a way of saying thank you to women – because
they are the true power of my country, the people driving it forward.”
A Guerrilla Girl who goes by KAHLO said, “ How can you really tell the
story of a culture when you don’t include all the voices within the culture?
Otherwise, it’s just the history, and the story, of power.” In this exhibit we
have a story of the power of men, and a story of the power of France in its
former colonies. We have the story of who finances exhibits in the contemporary
art world. Cartier is
owned by Compagnie Financière Richemont SA, based in Switzerland and headed by
a South African: Johann Rupert. As of 2014,
Richemont is the second-largest luxury goods company in the world and Rupert is
the 2nd richest man in Africa, valued at over 7 billion dollars.
I wanted to find a different story about Congolese women artists and
after searching, I came upon this. In April 2014, Ugandan born curator Robinah Nansubuga curated
an exhibition in Kinshasa called Women Without Borders, and it included 19
artists from central and east Africa, including the DRC. She estimates that “only about 10-20 out of 200 or 300
artists in a university here are women. We wanted to understand why there are
so few, and what challenges are holding them back.”
Other links of interest: