Artist Yinka Shonibare:
Reflections on the Journeys
of Our Ancestors
Yinka Shonibare: Works from the Permanent
Collection is the fourth installation in the Nancy and
Edwin Marks Gallery exhibition series devoted to showcasing
Copper-Hewitt, National Design Museum’s permanent collection
of 250,000 objects spanning twenty-three centuries. For this
exhibition, prominent Nigerian-British artist Yinka Shonibare
MBE focuses his attention on the Museum’s diverse collection
of travel-related objects from Europe, Asia, and America
ranging from the sixteenth century through the twentieth
centuries.
Shonibare has created
specifically for this installation two life-size sculptures
of the Museum’s founding sisters,
Sarah and Eleanor Hewitt, wearing late Victorian-style costumes
fashioned from his signature contemporary pseudo-African batik
textiles. The playful, visually arresting a theme the artist
has continually addressed throughout his career. The figures
of the Hewitt sisters are placed on stilts, symbolizing, according
to Shonibare, how the sisters “stand tall over their
contemporaries in terms of their taste and adventurous spirit.” Shonibare’s
sculptures are displayed alongside objects from Cooper-Hewitt’s
Product Design and Decorative Arts, Drawings, Prints, and Graphic
Design, and Wall Coverings departments, as well as from the
rare-book collection in the Museum’s National Design
Library.
Shonibare is a self-described “postcolonial
hybrid.” Born in London and raised in Nigeria, he often
explores the historical integration of disparate cultures in
his sculpture, photography, and, most recently, film. Through
his ironic and highly imaginative combinations, Shonibare,
a finalist for the prestigious Turner Prize in 2004, examines
cultural stereotypes of class, race, gender, and identity.
Transportation represents “fantasy fulfillment,” says
Shonibare, adding that, fundamentally, “travel is something
people do to improve themselves.” The artist hopes that
Museum visitors, upon viewing this exhibition, will reflect
on their own personal and travel histories and the journeys
of their ancestors.#
Reprinted with
permission of Smithsonian’s
Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum.
