Elisabeth Efua Sutherland, work in progress, Dance City, Newcastle. Photos: Fly Films UK
Elisabeth Efua Sutherland in residence
Connections and entanglements
Elisabeth Efua Sutherland joined us as one of the artists in residence in Newcastle for Contested Desires: Constructive Dialogues, a programme exploring the problematic legacy of European colonialism through artistic production and exchange.
Elisabeth’s research was driven by a desire to map stories, bodies and mythologies, and to examine the visibility (or lack thereof) and curation of black and African histories across time.
During her residency Elisabeth immersed herself in local history - mapping interconnecting stories of black and African people who visited the city or made it their home. Drawing on local archives, architecture, walking tours and sites of remembrance, Elisabeth started to explore the possibilities of creating an embodied map of black experiences located in the city.
From the African village at the North East Coast Exhibition of 1929 to Henry 'Box' Brown - a former enslaved person who performed at Newcastle's Music Hall as part of his anti-slavery tour across northern England; from African Lives in Northern England walking tour to the Arthur Wharton Foundation in Darlington celebrating the life and legacy of the world’s first black professional football player..
She presented her work in progress at Dance City, sharing it with collaborators and communities involved in her research.
The performative sharing drew on physical, oral and performative methods - weaving in markers of significance - for example a dance with foraged sea glass threaded to a pole to recall the ‘ivory bangle’ lady from the 4th century with African descent. At the centre of the performance was a long piece of cotton suggestive of the Ghanaian Asafo banners that are used by Fante warrior groups in festivals and community context to make statements about history, power, identity through the use of imagery as proverb - a concept that linked to DuBois’ data portraits, which in a sense posit infographics as proverb. DuBois’ data portraits - showcased in the Paris Exposition of 1900 and his ideas of African Diasporic Cartography were a core inspiration and conceptually central to the research methodology,
Elisabeth’s research explored the politics of visuality, and the legacies of extraction, materiality, wealth, displacement and coloniality.
In the process of research, connection and community come into being - where stories and narratives are shared and told again, offering an alternative to those withheld, silenced and discarded by colonialism. This is further grounded by Elisabeth’s performance and body based work, which with the shared experience, gives a place for black lives of the past to be ever entangled, abundant and experienced in lived culture today.
Find out more about Elisabeth here: contesteddesires.eu/artists
Elisabeth Efua Sutherland joined us as one of the artists in residence in Newcastle for Contested Desires: Constructive Dialogues, a programme exploring the problematic legacy of European colonialism through artistic production and exchange.
Elisabeth’s research was driven by a desire to map stories, bodies and mythologies, and to examine the visibility (or lack thereof) and curation of black and African histories across time.
During her residency Elisabeth immersed herself in local history - mapping interconnecting stories of black and African people who visited the city or made it their home. Drawing on local archives, architecture, walking tours and sites of remembrance, Elisabeth started to explore the possibilities of creating an embodied map of black experiences located in the city.
From the African village at the North East Coast Exhibition of 1929 to Henry 'Box' Brown - a former enslaved person who performed at Newcastle's Music Hall as part of his anti-slavery tour across northern England; from African Lives in Northern England walking tour to the Arthur Wharton Foundation in Darlington celebrating the life and legacy of the world’s first black professional football player..
She presented her work in progress at Dance City, sharing it with collaborators and communities involved in her research.
The performative sharing drew on physical, oral and performative methods - weaving in markers of significance - for example a dance with foraged sea glass threaded to a pole to recall the ‘ivory bangle’ lady from the 4th century with African descent. At the centre of the performance was a long piece of cotton suggestive of the Ghanaian Asafo banners that are used by Fante warrior groups in festivals and community context to make statements about history, power, identity through the use of imagery as proverb - a concept that linked to DuBois’ data portraits, which in a sense posit infographics as proverb. DuBois’ data portraits - showcased in the Paris Exposition of 1900 and his ideas of African Diasporic Cartography were a core inspiration and conceptually central to the research methodology,
Elisabeth’s research explored the politics of visuality, and the legacies of extraction, materiality, wealth, displacement and coloniality.
In the process of research, connection and community come into being - where stories and narratives are shared and told again, offering an alternative to those withheld, silenced and discarded by colonialism. This is further grounded by Elisabeth’s performance and body based work, which with the shared experience, gives a place for black lives of the past to be ever entangled, abundant and experienced in lived culture today.
Find out more about Elisabeth here: contesteddesires.eu/artists