I am aware that not everyone reading this weekly column is in Guyana. Nonetheless, last week I invited all to visit the exhibition The Seven Orishas & The Scarlet Thread, which I curated and is currently on at the National Gallery of Art, Castellani House. This week I am sharing the exhibition overview, which I was happy to pen from the catalogue, alongside photos of some work currently on view by the two artists, Alyce Cameron and Pekahiah James.
The intention is to entice you to visit if you are local, can visit, and have not visited. But more importantly, the intention is to share with those who may not be local some of what characterised the exhibition so you may be able to join in some of the excitement generated by the artists’ choice of subject matter, bold embrace of installation art, and their contemporaneity.
While this exhibition does not present the first instance of installation art in Guyana (and perhaps one day I will chronicle my own efforts at introducing this contemporary practice to Guyana), this is certainly the boldest in scale. Do visit and do enjoy.
The exhibition overview follows:
As much as the diversity of Guyana’s landscape and its flora and fauna is a source of excitement for visitors and engaged locals, so too is its mosaic of ethno-cultural’ and religious cultures. It is within this frame of multiculturalism that The Seven Orishas & The Scarlet Thread must first be seen. While the exhibition does not scream an evident Guyanese identity speaking about the country’s flora and fauna or the ‘One People, One Nation’ adage of the national motto, the work is grounded in a Guyanese-ness that is as evident as the ubiquity of water in our landscape.
Alyce Cameron tackles a topic that has become typical for Africa-descended artists in Guyana – African-ness. However, unlike those who rely on their feelings of an abstract and generalised sense of their African-ness, Cameron has researched substantially the culture and religion of an assumed culture of (her) origin.
From her research, she has opted to focus her lens on the Ifa religious traditions of the Yoruba of ancestral Yorubaland which is now subsumed in modern-day Benin, Togo, Ghana, and parts of Nigeria. So as West African religions call new attention and converts in the Global West, Cameron’s exploration can be seen as part of that resurgence of interest in an African past grounded in its spirituality. Thus, despite her Christian background, Cameron has endeavoured a lens of empathic viewing in rendering her seven Orishas accessible and appealing in The Seven Orishas.
Ifa is a monotheistic religion. However, as with Hinduism, the Supreme Being shares power with numerous deities. In Ifa, the Supreme Being is called Olodumare, and those with whom He shares power are called Orishas. They serve as intermediaries between humans and Oludumare, although Ifa devotees can also access Him directly. Each Orisha has particular domains of responsibility, attributes, and qualities.
Within this exhibition, Cameron creates a literal and visually appealing bridge for those who may wish to embark upon a journey of reconnecting with Oludumare through the Orishas.
While a scarlet thread is evident in the lines of the Christian New Testament, in The Scarlet Thread, Pekahiah James weaves and constructs a bridge not to foster connections but to illustrate the connections made as a consequence of crossing bridges of human relations. Intrigued by Asian cultures,
James explores this aspect of our national patrimony (and perhaps her own heritage) by investigating a potent myth with origins in China and Japan. Variously referred to as the ‘Red String of Fate,’ the ‘Red Thread of Fate,’ the universality of the ‘Myth of the Red String’ encourages us to pause in our fast-paced lives to savour the journey and connections fused and unfused along the way.
Whereas Cameron’s research was largely anthropological, James’ research was largely technical and thus the installation seen within this exhibition is as much an exploration of sculptural techniques as it is the implications of the ‘Myth of the Red String.’
The technique James utilises in fashioning her figures is her own modification of a technique she encountered. Cameron and James, therefore, both offer very legitimate approaches to artmaking and demonstrate very clearly the benefits of a research-driven studio practice over one that is grounded in feelings and nebulous notions about big topics that may be grounded in history, current affairs, or even one’s culture.
Alongside the presentation of their final project, Cameron and James are each presenting a mere three additional works that reflect parallel and intersecting thought.
Cameron is a painter par excellence and she shows that she is as much consumed by the ideas of painting as she is with the Orishas. Meanwhile, James explores the idea of the singularity of ‘sources’ of life. The exhibition The Seven Orishas & The Scarlet Thread is the culminating exhibition for students of the Class of 2022, who pursued a BA in Fine Art at the University of Guyana.
Akima McPherson is a multi-media artist, art historian, and educator.
