MELA-9, is an ongoing study of African expressions of form and functionality through craft and design. The series stems from the artist's understanding of archiving as a tool, from which to extract knowledge and imagined realities. Responding to objects extracted from Museum archives, where context, function or even spirituality are often erased; Southgate-Smith engages with these objects through instinct and play. Whilst treating each as a vessel guiding her/them through a pre-colonial landscape whilst, projecting us towards multiple futures.
I SEARCH (2023)
Items from home displayed alongside Past, is mourning (2023)
# At the Bottom of the River, Jamaica Kincaid (1983)
# Voices from twentieth-century Africa: Griots and Towncriers. Chinweizu (1989)
# TEETH KISSIN’ Where Elephants Reside. Divine Southgate-Smith (2022)
# Oware, a traditional game played in West Africa and the Caribbean known to be over 15,000 years old.
# Kissing cup, Ceramic made and gifted by Japanese Ceramicist Sharlen Nowaza (2022)
# Mask of Tengu (Demi-God) accompanied by a letter from Japanese Ceramicist Sharlen Nowaza (2022)
# Hosho, part of the percussion family in traditional Zimbabwean music, can also be found in Ghana.
# Bronze Banga Nut, wax print on Ankara cotton fabric.
# Communications regarding the loan of the Suku cups (object refs. 257 and 258) from the Sainsbury Centre of Visual Arts.
# Excel file detailing the artist's attempt at accessing images from various archives in the UK and Europe. (2022)
# Rejected letter for copyright usage from The British Museum (2022)
1. SUKU, SUKU #257 #258 (2023)
Title/Description: Cup
Born: 1900 - 1999
Object Type: Cup
Materials: Wood
Measurements: h. 114 x w. 120 x d. 100 mm Accession Number: 257
Historic Period: 20th-century
Production Place: Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo Cultural Group: Pende, Yaka
Credit Line: Donated by Robert and Lisa Sainsbury, 1973 Provenance: Formerly in the Evan Thomas Collection (no. 748). Gift from K. J. Hewett to Robert and Lisa Sainsbury in 1972. Donated to the Sainsbury Centre, University of East Anglia in 1973 as part of the original gift.
Life Story: This is a wooden copy of a small cup (Suka, kopa; Yaka, kyopa or mbaasa made from a pumpkin-shaped gourd, halved vertically. The cavity within is not divided and in use the drinker would not hold one end of the cup in the hollow of his palm, with index finger and thumb in the middle recesses. On both sides is a face representing a hemba nkisi, a northern Suku charm and initiation mask, intended to ward off unauthorised touching of the cup.
Margret Carey, 1997
Entry taken from Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection, Vol. 2: Pacific, African and Native North American Art, edited by Steven Hooper (Yale University Press, 1997)
p. 190.
Courtesy of Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts
Title/Description: Cup
Born: 1850 - 1950
Object Type: Cup
Materials: Wood
Measurements: h. 98 x w. 96 x d. 68 mm Accession Number: 258
Historic Period: 19th-century-Late, 20th-century-Early Production Place: Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo Cultural Group: Suku, Yaka
Credit Line: Donated by Robert and Lisa Sainsbury, 1973 Provenance: Gift from K. J. Hewett to Robert and Lisa Sainsbury in 1972. Donated to the Sainsbury Centre, University of East Anglia in 1973 as part of the original gift.
Life Story: This is a wooden copy of a small cup made from a pumpkin-shaped gourd, halved vertically. The cavity within is not divided and in use, the drinker would not hold one end of the cup in the hollow of his palm, with index finger and thumb in the middle recesses. On both sides is a face representing a hemba nkisi, a northern Suku charm and initiation mask, intended to ward off unauthorised touching of the cup.
Margret Carey, 1997
Entry taken from Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection, Vol. 2: Pacific, African and Native North American Art, edited by Steven Hooper (Yale University Press, 1997)
p. 182.
Courtesy of Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts