Bubblegum Club

Tag: colourism

  • A Gentle Magic // an independent documentary exploring skin bleaching in South Africa

    “bein alive & bein a woman & bein coloured is a metaphysical dilemma / i havent conquered yet”

    – ntozake shange

    It makes sense that a documentary about skin bleaching was made for black girls. Being a black girl, a dark skinned black girl, I know that I am a suitable member of the audience. Society has consistently told me that my quarter-to-midnight skin is undesirable so understand the simple joy of a documentary that attempts to speak of skin like mine as acceptable, beautiful and worth celebrating. More interestingly, this documentary attempts to understand why people are bleaching their skin and what the privileges of the desired outcome are.

    The documentary, which borrows its name from one of the most popular skin bleaching products in South Africa, Gentle Magic, is directed by Lerato Mbangeni and Tseliso Monaheng. The skin deep shots are captivating and each scene garners the profound perspectives of university students, artists, writers, cleaners, video vixens, skin doctors and sociologists from around the country.

    The complexities of this topic are highlighted throughout this documentary – male attention, Beyoncé, the definitions of beauty, self-esteem, health hazards, and the accessibility and affordability of the skin bleaching products.

    However, self-awareness seems to be crucial to this film because ultimately racial identity is at the core of skin bleaching. The desire to bleach ones skin does not seem to be innately due to our mainstream Eurocentric ideals, I actually think Colourism has just been part of the Black community’s daily bread for centuries. It would be easy to blame colonial and other oppressive regimes for possibly embedding this form of self-hate but I am not confident that that’s the root.

    I am still haunted by one of the slogans on André 3000’s 2014 Outkast reunion tour jumpsuits that read, “Across cultures, darker people suffer most. Why?” It is as if we all know this but cannot isolate the cause. The documentary itself is investigating the reasoning behind this ritual but the answers are terribly contradictory and ultimately there is an incompleteness in our understanding. However, the introspection of individuals and ultimately a culture that glorifies light skin, is imperative and the subtle advocacy of self-love is compelling.

    A Gentle Magic will be screened again here:

    26 November 2017 at RE: Capitoli

    2 December 2017 at Afropunk Battle of the Bands

    8 December 2017 at The Bioscope

  • Toyin Ojih Odutola // What is black?

    Toyin Ojih Odutola explores the sociopolitical constructs of skin colour through her multimedia drawings. This central focus comes from her personal journey of having to move from her home in Nigeria to the conservative state in the US, Alabama.

    “I’m doing black on black on black, trying to make it as layered as possible in the deepness of the blackness to bring it out. I noticed the pen became this incredible tool. The black ballpoint [pen] ink on blackboard would become copper tone and I was like ‘wow, this isn’t even black at all!’ The black board was like this balancing platform for the ink to become something else. I instantly recognized this notion, of how we think something is a certain way and in reality it is something else…” Ojih Odutola says in an interview about the show, My Country Has No Name (2013) in the International Review of African American Art.

    A Subtle Address, 2013

    Most of the figures she draws are coloured with black ink, but not all of them referencing being African or of African American descent. This is an extension of her question, “What is black?”. Her images require the viewer to interrogate the framework they consciously or unconsciously use to interpret skin colour and its connotations.

    For her first solo exhibition in New York titled To Wander Determined, Ojih Odutola presents an interconnected series of fictional portraits telling the lives of two Nigerian aristocratic families. These portraits consider the fluid nature of identity through the use of charcoal, pastel and pencil. She engages themes related to space, class and colour with the figures portrayed in luxury homes. However, the angles of lines used to construct these homes on canvas do not always align, making the backgrounds appear slightly distorted. The distortion invokes a sense of discomfort in the viewer, and it is up to the viewer to figure out the meaning of that discomfort.

    Wall of Ambassadors, 2017
    Winter Dispatch, 2016