Hew Locke
Hew Locke often works with found materials and ephemera to investigate the languages of colonial and post-colonial power. His series of manipulated share certificates refer to the violent history of colonial trade. Recently, he has produced a series of painted photographs depicting colonial architecture in his native Guyana.
Atta Gold, 2009:
Almond St, 2014:
Sonia Boyce
In the mid-1980s Sonia Boyce produced a series of paintings and pastels exploring the relationship between Britain’s colonial history and the representation of black women. Later works have built on this subject, looking at the de-personalised and fetishized black female body.
Lay back, keep quiet and think of what made Britain so great, 1986
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Plaited and Knotted, 1995:
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Jacob Lawrence
American painter Jacob Lawrence (1917-2000) gained fame for a series of ambitious works depicting the powerful narratives of historic individuals such as Toussaint L’Ouverture and Harriet Tubman. Bringing to life their heroic struggles for liberation from slavery and colonial rule, each work combined a series of sequential, figurative paintings with descriptive text.
The Life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, #14: The blacks were led by three chiefs, Jean Francois, Biassou, and Jeannot; Toussaint serving as aide-de-camp to Biassou, 1938:
The Life of Harriet Tubman, #16: Harriet Tubman spent many hours at the office of William Still, the loft headquarters of the antislavery Vigilence Committee in Philadelphia. Here, she pored…,1940:
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Yinka Shonibare MBE
Yinka Shonibare MBE often stages scenes using mannequins or actors dressed in Western-style period clothes cut from African textiles – referencing the history of colonialism, trade and globalisation. His Fake Death Picture series imagines the death of Lord Nelson - the figurehead of the British Empire - through the re-enactment of famous classical paintings depicting suicide and death.
Fake Death Picture (The Death of Chatterton - Henry Wallis), 2011:
Diary of a Victorian Dandy: 14.00 hours, 1998:
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Faisal Abdu'Allah
In Dullah ’69, Faisal Abdu'Allah has created a series of close-up portraits of individuals who lived in South Africa under Apartheid. The slang term ‘dullah’ references the passing on of stolen goods, recalling colonial history as well as Abdu'Allah’s personal history, and the lives of his African ancestors who were stolen from their homeland.
Dullah '69, 2011:
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Zineb Sedira
French-born Zineb Sedira often draws on her Algerian heritage to inform her art. In Sugar Routes, she explores the international sugar trade, its historical significance and the thousands of human lives it displaced. The multi-screen film installation Lighthouse in the Sea of Time explores two historic lighthouses in Algeria, built during French rule in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Sugar Routes I, 2013
Lighthouse in the Sea of Time, 2011 (Part I):
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Images from top: Atta Gold, 2009. Share series, Hew Locke © Hew Locke, All rights reserved, DACS 2015, Photo by the artist; Almond St, 2014, Hew Locke © Hew Locke, All rights reserved, DACS 2015, Photo: Charles Robinson; Lay back, keep quiet and think of what made Britain so great, 1986, Sonia Boyce © Sonia Boyce, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Image: © Arts Council Collection, Southbank Centre; Plaited and Knotted, 1995, Sonia Boyce © Sonia Boyce, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015; The Life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, #14: The blacks were led by three chiefs, Jean Francois, Biassou, and Jeannot; Toussaint serving as aide-de-camp to Biassou, Jacob Lawrence © Estate of Jacob Lawrence, ARS, NY and DACS, London 2015; The Life of Harriet Tubman, #16: Harriet Tubman spent many hours at the office of William Still, the loft headquarters of the antislavery Vigilence Committee in Philadelphia. Here, she pored…1940, Jacob Lawrence © Estate of Jacob Lawrence, ARS, NY and DACS, London 2015; Fake Death Picture (The Death of Chatterton - Henry Wallis), 2011, Yinka Shonibare MBE © Yinka Shonibare MBE, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Image courtesy Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and James Cohan Gallery, New York; Diary of a Victorian Dandy: 14.00 hours, 1998, Yinka Shonibare MBE © Yinka Shonibare MBE, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Image courtesy Stephen Friedman Gallery, London; Dullah 69, 2011, Faisal Abdu'Allah © Faisal Abdu'Allah, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Photo: Faisal Abdu'allah; Sugar Routes I, 2013, Zineb Sedira © Zineb Sedira, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Image courtesy The Third Line, Dubai and Plutschow Gallery, Zürich; Lighthouse in the Sea of Time, 2011 (Part I), Zineb Sedira © Zineb Sedira, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2015, Image courtesy kamel mennour, Paris.