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I’ve been obsessed with masquerades for as long as I can remember.
The second time I travelled to Nigeria was for Christmas in 1995 (the first time I had been a baby so have no real memories of that trip). We stayed over at an aunt’s in Onitsha and I can remember watching from the balcony with my various second cousins, distant relations and the housegirls as the masquerades would whip the boys with the painfully thin reeds that were bundled together to make brooms. I never saw any girls took part, other than to make jokes and roughly explain what was going on.
Every time since then there has always been one occasion for a masquerade, or a mmanwu to make an appearance, be it at a funeral or the construction of a new road. I used to sketch them, occasionally being gently reprimanded by my usually not-so gentle mother that “there were some things you weren’t to draw.”
My mother also told me other stories. One that particularly stuck in my mind was when a boy-cousin caught her drawing a mmanwu in the sand. He struck her, telling her off that this wasn’t a thing for girls to be a part of.
And yet.
Some of the most extravagant mmanwu are those of the maidens, the mmoa after whom I’ve named my artist persona (you can see one spectacular example above). With their beautifully carved coifs, delicate features and full figure costumes, sometimes I see them as pre-colonial drag queens, a connection between the headiness of the 80′s New York Vogue Scene and the cool extravagance of Afropunk. As a queer artist, I wonder how many of those mmoa devotees were not in fact gay men or transwomen, embodying and decoding their contemporary feminine mores.
In my spare time I’ve been sketching and creating what I call neo-mmanwu, remixes of the traditional Igbo masquerades with modern tropes. Some of them are quite humorous but for this latest project, I’ve taken a more serious direction.
For the past couple of months I’ve been working with Aliyah Hasinah to produce an immersive afrofuturist poetry and performance evening called Cosmic Ashoke. The idea was to take people on a journey through the history of blackness, with 6 performers representing our experiences and history through 6 chapters. Each chapter was also represented by a neo-mmanwu who was accompanied by a short poem:
Chapter One - The age of discovery: inspired by the history of discovery and invention within the African continent. We begin with a neo-mmanwu representing the prehistoric astronomers of Nabla Playa whose lineage - whether physical, psychic or spiritual - remains within the works of scientists like Katherine Johnson and Maggie Aderin Pocock.
Chapter Two - The age of Empire: a bittersweet reflection on the great empires of Africa’s past, both an inspiration and a challenge not only to the racist assumptions of white supremacy but to what we as black people should value, and what counts as true achievement.
Chapter Three - The age of Misremembering: the age of colonialism. I don't want to say much more on that other than I had to quickly whip up an installation piece made up of the components of the masquerade as I didn’t have enough time to complete the whole piece. However, as one of the more complex pieces, I will definitely still be working on that in my spare time.
Chapter Four - The age of Revolt (above).
Chapter Five - The age of Healing (otherwise known as Gal Dem Margaret): as an afrofuturist, I look to the past to inspire the future. Gal Dem Margaret is truly pan-africanist - her colouring inspired by the theology of ancient Egypt; her markings taken from Adinkra and Nsibidi and her garments a mishmash of sacred robes from across the African continent. The idea is that before we can get to the next chapter, there will be a reckoning and she is just the one to arbitrate it.
Chapter Six - The age of Reinvention: the future. New Multiverses are made from the old. Have we learned our lesson? Only the future will tell...
This was the first installation of the neo-mmanwu and I couldn’t have asked for a better setting, with so many talented poets and spoken word artists, their rhythms and words encircling the hanging neo-mmanwu, being absorbed by these creature of paper machine and fabric. I intend for these pieces to continue to grow and evolve and, who knows, hopefully be displayed at future Cosmic Ashokes.
Catching up as always. My two Inktober drawings so far. Yes, I have cheated a little but I will try and remain faithful to ink alone in future...
In the spirit of finishing projects I love but feel intimidated by, Inktober is dedicated to The Very Devils, a project I am hoping will grow into an immersive multimedia steampunk thriller adventure.
But may well remain as a half finished script, we shall see...!
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I’m working on a series of animations for an event in October called ‘Cosmic Ashoke’ with the amazing Artivist UK. I’m working with the amazingly talented @alconteh to produce the opening animation which depicts the birth of a character for now only known as the ‘Cypher’ and these are the storyboards.
Was pretty cool having never created storyboards or done a solely digital piece before. I quite like how its turned out so am thinking of using this style for the other pieces too.
Playing around with collage, victoriana and traditional Igbo craft. The masks are of Mmuo, or maiden spirits who would be performed by masquerades in South Eastern Nigeria. Not entirely satisfied with this piece but... well, that’s the whole point of experimentation!
Reminds me, I really need to get that paper on Masquerade as traditional Drag finished at some point.
Some Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell fan art for you. An imagining of a fairy at the Gentleman with Thistle Down Hair’s ball. A nicer version will be made available to buy as a print.
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An experiment in synthesising glitch and pop art. I love highfashion magazines for their visual audacity but I also love analysing the images, critiquing from my position as a black queer woman. Even though the images such as the one this was based feature fabulously expensive jewels probably unethically and unsustainably sourced, it interests me that so many of the women and girls who model them, are often from backgrounds less better off than those who mine them.
I was reminded of the unfortunate Madame du Barry who, although guillotined as being part of the ancien regime, came herself from middle class origins. It’s as though even we who might be less privileged in some ways but are successful in using the system to advance ourselves are as much in danger of being toppled and destroyed with it, by it.
The Snarky UX-er, a new character who complains a lot and thinks she’s cleverer than she atcually is. I promise it’s not always based on my own work experiences...
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