During our residency in Scarborough we got the chance to see the From Local to Global exhibition which provides a skilful overview of the exploration and exploitation of the Congo by Colonel James Harrison. Within the curatorial concept of the project an open and continuous conversation was sustained with various different forms of collaborations and interactions in relation to the present-day context. This way of engaging, as well as the exhibition display, demonstrates the practice of considering ethics and one's own positionality. If we think of institutions as gatekeepers, Scarborough Museums and Galleries is facilitating access and enabling us to establish our first contact with the collection, while intentionally attempting to understand, question and decentralise the white gaze. 

Within the second room a bridge between lived experiences and contemporaneity was composed. The language used had a sensitive tone and educational approach that called to attention current dynamics and situations in Congo faced by local and regional communities, not neglecting nor negating the brutality of colonial histories and their damages and consequences. In a corner there was a small dark enclosed space walled off by thick black sound-proofed textured fabric - creating a visual and auditory void - which could only be entered by a maximum of two people at a time. This intimate space felt frozen in time, detached from the wider context and ironically felt highly immersive with limited sensory stimulus. We put on headphones and sat in silence listening to gramophone recordings made in London in 1905 of conversations between Bokane and Mongonga, and singing by Bokane, Matuka, Kuarke and Amuriape. 

These voice recordings and the broader environment helped to create a more direct, profound and empathic moment with source materials in the archive as we tried in vain to understand and relate to their experiences and perspectives. The clicks, crackling and scratches of the gramophone needle felt disruptive against human voices; analogue processes obscuring and generating technological glitches that draw our attention away from the subjects and to methods and materiality. These mechanical interferences became a metaphor for a system, framework and society that were hearing, but not listening. Dancer, filmmaker and activist, Zinzi Minott, uses glitches as a metaphor for describing moments of disruptions in day-to-day lived experiences, e.g., police arbitrarily racially profiling an individual from a crowd and deciding to stop and search.  

The lived experiences of the six people of the Ituri forest are well documented but shrouded in mystery. We don’t even know the language that is being spoken, was it Kango, Bila, Efe, Lese or Asua? What were they talking about? Were they introducing themselves? What were they singing? Were they chanting? What were their experiences? Over the decades these reflections and considerations have become more necessary to address and given the same, if not more, importance than the stories of big game hunting narrated in Harrison’s diaries and represented in taxidermy. As Chinua Achebe mentioned in an interview with the Paris Review, "There is that great proverb - that until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter." 

Our research with colonial archives in the Portuguese context, specifically connected to the 1934 First Portuguese Colonial exhibition, hasn’t uncovered audio materials, however first-hand testimonies from exhibited indigenous people have been unearthed. There is a complaint from the Guinea-Bissau group that travelled to Porto, Portugal. “We stopped farming this year because of the exhibition and they didn't give us anything at all. We were only given 2 blankets for each person. Those who worked harder on the show were and are the unhappiest. If we go back to our land like that, our companions will make fun of us, you see, it's a shame for us.” A translator and intermediary had written this passage on their behalf for the attention of the Portuguese government. In addition to being exposed at the exhibition, they were forced to work on the construction of pavilions for the exhibition itself without pay. All Bissau-Guineans signed this document with their fingerprints. These human touchstones engender personhood, subjectivity and fix language to the body (e.g., the ridges and furrows on fingertips speaking to us as tactile phonics) while exposing communication barriers.   

These considerations bring to the forefront concepts of care and healing, and an appeal to accountability and responsibility. Were Bokane, Mongonga, Masutiminga, Matuka, Kuarke and Amuriape financially remunerated? How much money did James Harrison gain from exhibiting them across the UK from 1905 to 1908? How are we individually and collectively accountable for the material wealth and knowledge production gained from his exploitation? How can this approach generate new narratives, understanding and perspectives of the Mbuti? More broadly, how are these questions relevant to our current relationship with Congo? The Bambuti Lives section of the website, led by Furaha Mussanzi addresses these questions. 

We’ve used different types of questions (e.g., binary, leading, probing, rhetorical and open-ended) at various points throughout our residency. The With/out Modernity deck of cards produced by Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures helped with teasing out reflections individually, but also within our arts collective, across the curatorial team and members of the public. Binary thinking can be limiting and reductive, however it can also lead to more expansive and open-ended reflections if open to challenges. Some binary oppositional themes and concepts started to emerge; eternal / ephemeral, conceal / reveal and same / different. During an artist’s talk with citizen researchers on 12th October 2022, Keith Barley noted “Modern Relevance v Modern Distortions”, which got us thinking, how can a relevant news item be distorted? Generating questions helped us to form deeper connections and relationships with ourselves and our environment. We started to reimagine archival materials in the James Harrison collection while thinking about the complex layers of colonial legacies. 

In the Performance 

“Stranger performance has seldom been seen at a place of entertainment. The point of it was that there is no performance at all, or, rather, that no one can tell whether there will be a performance or not, and if there is one what it will be.’ The Africans, if inclined to do nothing, did nothing. ‘This is very interesting and a piquant change from the stereotyped programme. Will the pygmies do anything or not, and if they do anything, what will it be? Last night they did very little, and just when they were getting into their stride they stopped abruptly for the strangest reason; some foolish person began to applaud them… Performers who stop at the first sound of applause are truly a novelty and worth seeing” (The Times, 1905) 

A journalist from The Times wrote this description after seeing the Bambuti people at one of their performances. The communication and staging of the event choreographs entertainment no matter what is done or not done; we learn more about the audience's attitudes than the people on the stage. Bodies are othered and the audience only needs to gaze at them to satisfy their curiosity. This context denies them their humanity and makes it impossible to escape projected stereotypes that creates subalternation and a differentiation between the audience and those on stage. This introduces an additional voyeuristic aspect, even if we assume that the group weren’t aware of this gaze. What ethical questions should have been posed? Before their arrival, it appears the human rights organisation the Aborigines' Protection Society were raising these issues to the Foreign Office and requesting that the group were denied entry into the country. This attempt failed. Financial gain, entertainment and propagating pride in the empire were promoted at the expense of human rights. 

Na Performance: Spontaneous Responsibility

We started to think about the layout and staging of the From Local to Global exhibition as we walked around the gallery rooms. We modified the lighting in the third room and added chairs, creating an audience seating area to one side and a focal point on the other. We remained behind a curtain and waited a few minutes to build anticipation before entering the room.

We took a performative approach and occupied a position on stage, not delivering any (active) action. “Na Performance” in Portuguese translates as “In the Performance”. While concealing and revealing the body and the gaze, a natural engagement with the public took place, within a game of expectation and anticipation. Expecting a presentation, the observer was without consent incorporated into the performance. A camera was set up on stage with the lens directed towards the audience and linked to a projector which was live-streaming footage. Seeing a moving image of the public on stage, mirroring their gaze and their involuntary attention to being observed, evokes questions such as, who is watching who? Who is the observer? Who is observed? Power dynamics were accentuated, while reversing agency. 

The concept of panopticism introduced by French philosopher, Michel Foucault, describes the increasing surveillance and control mechanisms and its influence on social conformity by the individual, in the development of western society since the 18th century. Panoptic structures function as architectures of power. Not only directly but also through (self-) disciplining of the observed subjects, as the observed can never be certain of if and when they are observed, which have found their place in the 'human zoos'. They objectify (turn into objects) the people on display, subjecting them to the gaze of the ogling public, influencing their behaviour.  

Image title: Panopticon

Imagine caption: AI generated image using word search ‘panopticon’ on Canva AI. This panopticon construction illustrates the many observation angles created from the centre, thereby triggering and reinforcing disciplined behaviour.

What are our expectations when attending a presentation? What if these expectations are not met and these structures are being reversed? 

Demands for equal rights not only manifest themselves in current dialogues of socially critical and political debates, they particularly shape everyday experiences. How can a consideration of ethics and our positionality inform our practice? How can we talk about human rights, love, care and healing with such violent content?