Ozioma Onuzulike has given yam a new definition. This can be seen in the strategic positioning of yams in the exhibition space of the Centre for Contemporary Art (CCA) Yaba, Lagos in a show curated and organized by Centre’s curator, Iheanyi Onwuegbucha titled ‘Seed Yams of our Land’
For people from Eastern Nigeria, the installations will look familiar because yam barns are a common sight in its rural areas. However, a viewer who knows nothing about the origins of yam will be impressed by the patterns created by the yams and the way they are displayed.
Onuzulike must have paid close attention to the techniques and patterns of tying real yams in barns as he replicates this in creating lines of ceramic yams and yam seedlings forged from clay collected from the popular university town of Nsukka, Enugu State.
From a distance, the long rows of yams hanging on the wall, or suspended on metal frames to create barn frames look real, but, on closer examination, the glassy and hollow surface is exposed to the inquisitive viewer.
Yam plays a central role in the Igbo tradition and has its festival celebrated by Igbo people in Nigeria and the Diaspora.
In this exhibition, Onuzulike turns yam into a tool for social, political, economic and spiritual discourse. The two-year project takes its roots from one question: what does the future hold for the seed yams (Youth) of our land?
With this timely exhibition, he shows that yams have more to offer than filling hungry stomachs.
In the Bible, God moulded man from clay and Onuzulike takes it as his basic material and explores the violent studio processes of pounding, cutting, crushing and firing as fitting metaphors for the human conditions in Africa today. He shows how politics, hunger, unemployment, banditry and armed conflicts in Africa hurt the younger generation (read yam seeds).
The space looks like a cross between a yam barn, a market place, a ceramic shop and a hospital that also puts yams on display, and a true representation of Onuzulike’s thought process in creating the installations.
While some of the yams look like they have been attacked by nematodes, another set takes the shape of bowls, with each installation telling its own story. For example, the installation ‘Yam Fields’ comprises ceramic yams in wooden enclosures and x-rays installations that are placed under the light.
Like all the yams displayed, there are cuts on the body of each, symbolic of the scars of war, deprivation, destruction and the challenges faced by the African every day. The x-ray part of the installation signifies something jarring yet hopeful- a broken bone joined together by metal to assist with the healing process.
This could indicate Onuzulike’s optimism that things can only get better amidst conflicts, politics, unemployment and banditry.
Onuzulike, who is also a poet, used the exhibition to launch his latest poetry collection which addresses the same themes as the exhibition. The artist inspires everyone that visits his exhibition by reiterating that what we consume can also be used as a powerful tool to tell real African stories.
1 comment
Great Exhibition