3 minute read
The Project Room - So She was turned to a Pillar of Salt
In this body of work, artist Jo Rogge returns to Namibia with a solo show built on their role as a witness and social commentator on a myriad of issues unfolding around them. Grappling with concerns ranging from the personal to the societal, the temptation to read the work as a form of activism is irresistible. A radical feminist reading is a prerequisite if we are to make sense of the title, bearing in mind that Lot’s loyal wife resisted a commandment, looking back to witness the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, an incident that “liberated” her from enduring the pain of continuing to live with would-be “traitors”, albeit she is said to have been turned into a pillar of salt. To this, the artist has added the rejoinder: “So what?”
The Lady Chatelaine was always going to feature a prince –the artist presents the lifeless body of a black figure lying on a supposed bed of roses, while the red motif resembles the spilling of blood. In this painting, Rogge takes on the matter of hate killings in Namibia, specifically referencing a recent brutal and senseless murder widely covered by local media. The conceptual abstractions Supplication I and Supplication II, although stylistically different, echo this theme – a solemn plea for change in the existing reality. Mythical references also offer clues to the works Andromeda’s Escape and The Three Fates
In the series of text-based salvaged textiles, Jou Ma se Doilie, the artist casts their net beyond queer tropes, capturing memes largely culled from social media, creating a tongue in-cheek narrative of stitched words over exquisitely fine embroidery from the past.
What is desired and what is discarded seems to be a central mantra in both the artist’s life and the process of their practice. What is self-censorship? What leads one to edit, distort and deface the past? What is there to hide? Could it be shame? Only fragments of the truth, disjointed narratives and a distortion of reality remain. The live art performance in which Rogge erases their written journals and artworks evokes a number of questions for the audience, concerning not only the artists’ personal journey but also the violent past of recorded history.
Discarded materials, past their use, also largely dictate Rogge’s spontaneous sculptural compositions. As is the case with artists in most southern African countries, this form of upcycling emerged as an improvisation mechanism for artists unable to access conventional art materials, either due to their high costs or scarcity. Interestingly, materials of this nature always add layers of meaning to the work as they carry multiple accumulated stories.
A consistent thread underlining this body of work is Rogge’s refusal to be boxed, as Stephen King reminds us in The Shawshank Redemption:
Some birds are not meant to be caged, that’s all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild. So, you let them go, or when you open the cage to feed them, they somehow fly out past you.
Rogge’s solo exhibition, so she was turned to a pillar of salt, will be held at The Project Room in Windhoek from 13 September to 12 October 2024.
- Barnabas Ticha Muvhuti
The Project Room - Namibia
