Originally posted by the Voice of America.
Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America,
a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in
the public domain.


        Smithsonian Exhibit of African Films Explores Our Sense of Time

   by Rosie Brown

   Rachel Rymont did not plan on spending part of her day inside a dark
   museum when she came into DC for errands. However, one look at the
   National Museum of African [1]Art's exhibit "Senses of Time: Video and
   Film-based Works of Africa," and the Baltimore artist was hooked.

   "Senses of Time" is a video and film exhibit meant to examine how time
   is experienced and produced within the body. The film aspect is a big
   part of what sets this exhibit apart from others in the museum.

   "It's a really different experience than being in a gallery or looking
   at a painting," Rymont said. "It kind of forces you to step back and
   really co-exist with the piece instead of just glancing at it."

   ''The exhibit, co-organized alongside the Los Angeles County Museum of
   Art, features seven works by six artists. Though time is the theme that
   draws all the pieces together, the content differs wildly from piece to
   piece.

   In "Un Ballo in Maschera," based on Giuseppe Verdi's 1859 opera A
   Masked Ball, dancers twirl across the screen wearing elaborate costumes
   in old European styles fashioned together with African-esque fabrics.
   Yinka Shonibare's piece questions the cyclical nature of time as the
   king, played by a woman, is assassinated only to rise and dance once
   more.

   In contrast to this colorful spectacle, Moataz Nasr's film, "The
   Water," was shot completely in black and white. Faces appear onscreen
   framed by a puddle on the ground, but right before the viewer is able
   to make out any details, a foot stomps the image out of existence.

   ''Art and politics

   Rymont appreciated how the exhibit was political without being preachy.

   "A lot of time with political work, there's a tendency for things to
   get a bit cold or didactic, but that didn't happen in there," she said.
   "All of it was very moving, and it was very human."

   Sammy Baloji's "Mémoire" is perhaps the most overtly political piece
   in the exhibit. Filmed against a series of abandoned copper mines in
   the Democratic Republic of Congo, choreographer and dancer Faustin
   Linyekula twists his body in an animated interpretive dance while
   speeches from some of the country's past and present leaders play.

   ''The piece highlights how the reality of the present has failed to
   live up to the promises of the past, expressed in a heartbreaking
   manner when Linyekula is left screaming "Vive l'independance" (Long
   live independence) to nothing but silence.

   For Sue Williamson, who considers herself a human rights activist as
   well as an artist, creating "There's Something I Must Tell You" was all
   about opening up channels of intergenerational discourse. In the film,
   six South African women who were activists during the Mandela
   generation tell stories of their hardships to their granddaughters and
   other young female relatives.

   "I think all of us have this really important relationship [with our
   grandmothers], and only too often your grandmother dies and then it's,
   `Oh, I wish I'd asked her that'," Williamson told VOA via a Skype
   interview. "You just miss the opportunity of really finding out about
   her life."

   Williamson cites living through apartheid in South Africa as a large
   influence on the way she incorporates social justice into her art. "We
   didn't even know when apartheid was going to end, so as artists, there
   was a very strong movement in South Africa," Williamson said. "We felt
   it was our responsibility to work in whatever way that we could to try
   to change the social situation."

   She hopes that viewers are able to understand through these stories the
   universal experiences women face around the globe.

   The human scale of time

   "About to Forget" takes a more personal approach to the topic of time.
   In a comment on its transcendent nature, artist Berni Searle has cut
   three silhouettes of family images from red crepe paper, and the images
   dissolve on-screen as water surrounds them, resulting in scenes
   reminiscent of blood flowing through water.

   In her second piece in the exhibit, "A Matter of Time," Searle walks
   across a transparent surface that has been covered in olive oil. Every
   time she takes a step forward, her body inevitably slides back down the
   screen again.

   ''Much like the famed Aldous Huxley novel it is named after, "Brave New
   World I" by Theo Eshetu focuses on the way technology warps the human
   experience. A TV flashes a disjointed kaleidoscope of scenes, from cute
   animals to the Twin Towers, but the mirrors angled around the TV turn
   the images into a repeating globe that captures the viewer as well.

   All seven pieces play simultaneously within the exhibit hall. The
   effect is a viewing experience that challenges not only perceptions of
   time, but what the medium of film can accomplish.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [2]http://www.voanews.com/content/african-films-explore-sense-of-time/3
   455873.html

References

   1. https://africa.si.edu/exhibitions/current-exhibitions/senses-of-timevideo-and-film-based-works-of-africa/
   2. http://www.voanews.com/content/african-films-explore-sense-of-time/3455873.html