Take Me to the Water presents a holistic survey of Ayana V. Jackson ‘s work to date, a culmination of varied discursive elements present in Jackson’s more than a decade long career. These portraits and movement studies offer a sense of the breadth of her practice, while at the same time taking her into new territories with regard to the range of her performances.

Ayana V. Jackson has used the archival impulse to assess the impact of the colonial gaze on the history of photography and its relationship to ideas about the body. She uses her lens to deconstruct 19th and early 20th century portraiture as a means for questioning photography’s role in constructing identities. Her thesis is further complicated by the presence of the artist’s figure. She uses her own body to perform the characters with whom she concerns herself.

Ayana V. Jackson’s work seeks to crystallize the experience of contemporary Africa and African diasporic societies. She uses honed technical skills to create hauntingly candid portraits that depict varying constructions of African and African-American identity. Her images have a compelling complexity: They are richly laced historical allusions, reappropriations of past moments and maps of the ethical considerations involved in the relationship between photographer, subject and viewer.

While Take Me to the Water is consistent with the artists ongong “memory work,” it is a striking departure from her commitment to lived histories as she has chosen to embrace the magical worlds of speculative fiction. Her new characters inhabit an aquatopia populated by aquahumanoids whose attributes are inspired by African and African Diasporic water spirits. From Olokun to Mame Coumba bang, from Kianda to Drexciya, from Yenanja to Mamiwata, Jackson is interested in “the mythic worlds we have studied,” yet emphasizes that she is, “more concerned with those we have been taught to forget.”

Ayana V. Jackson’s photographs are included in multiple public and private collections including The Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC; The Newark Museum, NJ; The JP Chase Morgan collection, NY; Princeton University Art Museum, NJ; the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; The MoCP Chicago, IL; and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA. Born in the United States, based between Johannesburg, New York and Paris, Jackson was a 2014 New York Foundation for the Arts Fellow for Photography, and the recipient of the 2018 Smithsonian Fellowship.

For further information, please contact Mariane Ibrahim Gallery
Take me to the water by Ayana V. Jackson
from September 20 – October 26, 2019.

MARIANE IBRAHIM
437 N. Paulina St
Chicago, IL 60622
Opening September 20, 2019

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Curated by Jeanne Mercier and Baptiste de Ville d’Avray of photography platform Afrique in Visu and the independent curator Madeleine de Colnet, the exhibition brings together the work of approximately 40 emerging and established photographers who are working from a distinctly African perspective. The artists examine universally relevant cultural concepts of tradition, spirituality, family and the environment, within the context of modern African experiences and daily life.

Africa Is No Island celebrates Afrique in Visu’s decade long working practice by selecting artists who have previously shown work on the platform as well as those from within Fondation Alliances’ collection. This platform itself has become a “visual territory”, overcoming borders and reporting different perspectives on, around and from the African continent. The curators have chosen works based on the following three themes; ‘Je suis ma représentation’ (I am my own representation), Dessiner des géographies’ (Drawing Borders) and ‘Recueillir l’histoire’ (Transcribe History). This display runs alongside a collage-based photography installation of works by other Afrique in Visu artists which covers part of the exhibition space.

The museum space has been transformed by architecture firm lazraqbret into an immersive environment inspired by the traditional architecture of Moroccan medinas, which are typically walled, with many narrow and maze-like streets. Visitors enter the exhibition via a door shaped in the customary circular style. The complex corridors ensure that visitors explore artworks in a staggered and measured manner, concealing the rich variety of artworks within. The exhibition is accompanied by a sound installation by Italian artist Anna Raimondo which emulates the everyday noises of Marrakech. By immersing the audience in a unique audiovisual environment, the setting brings to life the photographic practice in present-day Africa while reflecting MACAAL’s commitment to placing Moroccan art within the wider context of African cultural output.

The multi-layered images of Benin-based, Ivory Coast-born photographer Ishola Akpo blur the lines between fiction and reality. The series L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux, shown previously at Lagos Photo Festival, explores the photographer’s family history and memories through images which detail his grandmother’s dowry: gin bottles, clothes and beads.

Johannesburg-based artist Lebohang Kganye’s photography incorporates her interest in sculpture and performance, as well as her efforts to archive and memorialise her personal history and identity through family photographs.

Ecological issues linked to plastic and electronic waste are recurrent themes in Nyaba Léon Ouedraogo’s series Les Phantoms du Fleuve Congo which is inspired by the colonial-era text The Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. The works create a contemporary vision of the Congo River by showing life as it is lived in and around the symbolic artery of Africa.

Maïmouna Guerresi, a multimedia artist working with photography, sculpture, video, and installation, creates images which are suffused with spiritualism and are directly related to her own conversion to Sufism. Using recurring motifs such as the veil, her portraits are an affirmation and celebration of female spirituality and African womanhood.

Participating artists

• Anna Raimondo, Italy
• Ayana V Jackson, United States of America
• Baudouin Mouanda, Congo-Brazzaville
• Edgar Marsy, Réunion
• François-Xavier Gbré, Ivory Coast
• Hicham Benohoud, Morocco
• Hicham Gardaf, Morocco
• Ishola Akpo, Benin
• Joan Bardeletti, France
• Joana Choumali, Ivory Coast
• Lebohang Kganye, South Africa
• Leila Alaoui, France-Morocco
• Maïmouna Guerresi, Italy-Senegal
• Mohamed El Baz, Morocco
• Mohammed El Mourid, Morocco
• Mohammed Laouli, Morocco and Katrin Ströbel, Germany
• Mouna Karray, Tunisia
• Mustapha Azeroual, France-Morocco
• Namsa Leuba, Switzerland-Guinea
• Nicola Lo Calzo, Italy
• Nyaba Léon Ouedraogo, Burkina Faso
• Sammy Baloji, Democratic Republic of the Congo Walid Layadi
• Marfouk, Morocco

Paricipating artists, Africa is No Island; Collage-based photography installation of works

• Abdoulaye Barry, Chad
• Adrien Bitibaly, Burkina Faso
• Baudouin Mouanda, Congo-Brazzaville
• Carolle Benitah, France-Morocco
• Cristina de Middel, Spain
• David Lemor, France-Réunion
• Fakhri El Ghezal, Tunisia
• Fatoumata Diabaté, Mali
• Fethi Sahraoui, Algeria
• François-Xavier Gbré, Ivory Coast
• Georges Senga, Democratic Republic of the Congo
• Héla Ammar, Tunisia
• Hélène Jayet, France-Mali
• Hicham Gardaf, Morocco
• Ishola Akpo, Benin
• Joan Bardeletti, France
• Joana Choumali, Ivory Coast
• Lebohang Kganye, South Africa
• Nabil Boutros, Egypt-France
• Namsa Leuba, Switzerland-Guinea
• Nestor Da, Burkina Faso
• Nicola Lo Calzo, Italy
• Nyaba Léon Ouedraogo, Burkina Faso Philippe Guionie, France
• Seydou Camara, Mali
• Wiame Haddad, France-Morocco-Tunisia Ymane Fakhir, Morocco
• Yo-Yo Gonthier, France-Réunion

Africa is No Island

Museum of African Contemporary Art Al-Maden (MACAAL), Al Maaden, Sidi Youssef Ben Ali, 40000
Marrakech

Tuesday – Sunday, 10h – 18h

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