In the Edo language, SE-YA-MA means «to remember». The artist Samson Ogiamien chose this verb to embody this capsule in which his sculptural and performative work is presented in dialogue with the objects from the Benin Kingdom (Nigeria) looted by British colonial troops in 1897 and dispersed on the art market during the 20th century. Our relationship was forged around Iyagbon’s Mirror, the show is dedicated to the agony of museum objects disconnected from their ritual uses, which he co-wrote with the compagnie Onyrikon and which MEG co-produced in spring 2022. Our shared ambition to raise awareness of the duty to remember colonial violence, which museums must fulfil to address the futures of their collections, is an enduring one.
Iyagbon’s Mirror, in its version co-produced by MEG in May 2022
In a western museum an artwork is stolen to become a ritual artefact. The audience is first surprised and then invited to join the action following the artists along a promenade leaving the museum. Outside an artistic ritual is held playing with the magical dimension which we are able to create around an object and inviting the audience to experience it.
This project was born by the encounter between the artistic universes of Samson Ogiamien and Juri Cainero. Juri is a European artist who has been experimenting and researching around the ritual and animistic roots of art for years. Samson is an African artist who lives in Graz working between African tradition and European everyday life. Iyagbon’s Mirror is a common project, born as a reflection of two mirroring yet opposite worlds. To this first reversed mirror one additional angle of reflection is added by Beatriz Navarro (Mexico) the choreographer of Onyrikon. Her somatic approach to movement and composition is an attempt to link the external with the internal world.
Compagnie Onyrikon & Samson Ogiamien
This exhibition is part of “Remembering, Geneva in the Colonial World” a temporary exhibition
See the whole project on website of MEG/ Musée d’ethnographie de Genève:
https://colonialgeneva.ch/3.3-en
