amed cultural studies theorist
Stuart Hall once asked, ‘What is
the black in black popular culture?’
Writing several decades ago, Hall’s
question would re-emerge time and again
as black – and particularly African- creatives struggled to find a space of
their own and a language to express
their particular experience of being alive.
For artist, author and Oxford University
professor Samson Kambalu, the beginning
of exploring these questions comes with
an acceptance of a uniquely African
perspective, which does not always adhere
to our linear ideas of time, space and form.
In his most recent exhibition Nyasaland/
Analysand, presented by Goodman
Gallery, Kambalu reaches back into his
childhood experiences to present a version
of abstract art that is most true to his
perceptions and ideas of Africa, and infuses
this with his background in education.
Kambalu is at once free flowing and
structured, playful and considered,
presenting a body of work that satiates
the aesthetic appetite, but tells a deeper
story upon a second look. ‘At all times,
I am living between a uniquely African
non-linear sense of time and the contrast
of my Western education,’ he says. ‘I figured
out early on that the idea of representation
as the means to create art was extremely
limiting. I had this epiphany that maybe my
values were totally different. And instead
of being worried, I’ve embraced that.’
This ethos has run like a current
throughout Kambalu’s work, which spans
sculpture, filmmaking, painting and even
ethnomusicology. Instead of replicating
what he saw in Western art books and
during his formal education at Malawi’s
Chancellor College, Nottingham Trent
University in England and Chelsea
College of Art and Design in London, he
has simply transported an internal sense
of ‘Malawianness’ everywhere he goes.
As part of his Nyasaland/Analysand
exhibition, Kambalu reflects on a local
brand of chewing gum that came with
multiple flags, which he and his friends
would trade. In its 2019 iteration, the
exhibition sees Kambalu reimagining the
process of flag making, building a catalogue
of shapes and colours that live together in
an unlikely composition. ‘Of course I didn’t
know it at the time, but the shuffling of
the flags as a child was my first experience
of abstraction,’ he says. ‘So that’s why
I keep saying that I didn’t have to learn that
from Western education. It was a natural
part of the way we as Malawian children
were interacting with our world.’
But Kambalu is both artist and academic
at once, never trying to box himself into
a corner. He rejects the idea that his being
based in the United Kingdom means thathe is – to use his words – ‘blackfacing for
a white audience’. He emphasises that he
knows who he is and his connection to his
homeland, and can draw on this anywhere
by just being himself. But he is not of the
opinion that his work could be what it is
without his academic background.
‘I’m not really a romantic. I don’t
entertain the idea of innate talent,’ he says.
‘Even in traditional settings, you needed
to train under a master drummer or a
master mask maker. You need to have some
training to refine your work and become
connected to what you are doing. Otherwise
you may end up making work that is
simply entertaining to tourists.’
Despite this training, and the success
of his latest exhibition and all 17 others,
Kambalu’s mission is still clear. He wants
to create work that is honest, considered
and stems from his own reality rather
than imposed discourses. While Kambalu
recognises the importance of movements
like decolonisation, he maintains that he
is not political. ‘In art, we are pursuing
sovereignty, not power,’ Kambalu says.
‘My passion for art is no less than it was
15 years ago, and I’m not worried about
whether or not I have a Wikipedia page or
whether I am famous. All I want is to remain
surprised and challenged, and always
work with a childlike sense of wonder.’ O
goodman-gallery.comf
PHOTOGRAPHS: COURTESY OF GOODMAN GALLERY
THIS SPREAD
Samson Kambalu’s Bubble Gum
flags, as shown at his Nyasaland/
Analysand exhibition (2019) at
Goodman Gallery in Johannesburg.