Tracing the Legacy of Black Womanhood Through the Work of Five Artists

“In 1925, Josephine Baker, an American dancer from Saint Louis, Missouri, made her debut on the Paris stage in La Revue nègre at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, wearing nothing more than a skirt of feathers and performing her danse sauvage . She was an immediate sensation in Jazz-Age France, which celebrated her perceived exoticism; quite the opposite of the reception she had received dancing in American choruses.

“The sexualisation of the Black female body continues with the white European interest of Josephine Baker. In contrast to the stereotypical image of the mammy depicting Black women in the United States, Europe developed another one which we may call the Jezebel. According to Merriam and Webster dictionary, a Jezebel is an “impudent, shameless, or morally unrestrained woman.” Josephine Baker perfectly portrayed that cliché when she came to France in the middle of the 1920s.

“Baker embodies an important question for me – why is a woman’s appreciation for her body, and her astronomical levels of self-confidence, painted as indecency and immorality? We want to simultaneously frown upon and marvel at the exhibitionism of pop stars of today, and this conundrum existed in full force in the way Baker was received in America and Europe.

“In 2009, she began experimenting with incorporating video records of these events with the resulting works, such as in the diptych in the exhibition. “I wanna be evil, I wanna be mad,” croons Eartha Kitt, “But more than that, I wanna be bad.” The lyrics heard in the video explore womanhood liberated from the gendered expectations of purity and fragility.

“Building on this legacy, Thomas portrays women who ‘are presenting to me, through their lens, how they want to be represented’ – in this case, Keri, a trans woman, posing and dancing to Kitt’s song. Also featured in this is Mickalene Thomas’ mother. This film is a newly-created piece forseries and loop the characters into a continuous reel.”

CHANEL

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Source: The Telegraph - 🏆 41. / 63 Read more »