Cathy's Art Diary

Striking sculpture at the Victoria and Albert Museum by Nigerian artist Sokari Douglas Camp.   This work complements the African Fashion exhibition and is a modern take in the Three Graces using Nigerian influences. It also evidently quotes a William Blake anti-slavery print which I’m off to look up. I love the way this is made of what looks at first glance to be coloured scrap metal and how it sits among the Rodin pieces. Closes 14 May 2023

A bright temporary public sculpture outside the Design Museum as part of the Kensington and Chelsea Art Week by Sokari Douglas Camp. The piece is based on the idea that in the 19th century slaves were allowed one day a year to party which the artist saw as beginning of Carnival. The figures are African figures in sailors uniform with elaborate headdresses referencing colonial past. Tea is also there as a symbol of nourishment as well as the colonial past. The figures looked great in the space and gave a splash of colour against concrete buildings. Closes 30 August 2022    

Sculptural installation at St Paul’s Cathedral by Sokari Douglas Camp to mark 50 years since Martin Luther King preached at the cathedral and the abolition of slavery. The work consisted of six life sized steel figures representing stages of the slavery story including a figure in indigenous clothes and a plantation worker through to post slavery years including a Sierra Leone woman and a man in an executive suit. The figures were very imposing and you could look them in the eye and really relate to them. Although very modern they fit the space well and did not sit at all strangely with the acres of commemorative marble figures.