Liz Johnson Artur
The Russian-Ghanaian artist had two solo exhibitions in 2019, at the South London Gallery and the Brooklyn Museum, New York. Since moving to London in 1991, she has continued to dedicate herself to documenting the lives of communities from the African diaspora, adding to her ongoing project Black Balloon Archive.
“I wanted to approach the subject of masculinity from a woman’s perspective. My mum made the needlepoints [of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper and Mona Lisa and Iphigenie by Anselm Feuerbach]; she began making The Last Supper when I was 15 and it took her two years to complete, so I grew up with this image. She did so many needlepoints. They were made at home and she never showed them to anyone. Like the voguing classes I documented — the girls went there for themselves, it wasn’t to entertain anyone.”
Liz Johnson Artur type of photography is very cultural and has a very specific type of clothing used, most of the photos show what the girls wear such as short crop tops and shorts, some would wear vest or maybe some basket ball shorts which doesn’t really show masculinity.
However Liz likes to recreate photos with ‘men’ wearing making up and dressing up like girls and this doesn’t necessarily represent that they are making fun of women and how women are portrayed to be like, I would say women are very soulful and like to dress up which isn’t the case for everyone as there are people who like to stay cosy and not as dress up which doesn’t make them less feminine. Also we have men dressing up as women which doesn’t make them fully women but they have a chance to express themselves, although many people have very strong opinions about how certain genders act such as men are strong and big headed and should act as if they have power and control and women are seen to be more sensible and strong working, they are more caring and they look after the children, cook dinner. Most people don’t like changing that as it can be seen as insulting to dress up as the opposite gender. This artist helps us to view why some people might be doing it since they are looking for themselves or a way to express themselves, they want to feel more connected to a certain type of gender, as different genders have different topics to discuss, such as makeup for girls and possibly sports for boys, although it isn’t wrong for other gender’s to relate to each of the topics it just shows a stereotype of what we as a society are used to. I like the idea of getting the different genders to dress up as it shows that we should accept people as a whole and let them express themselves as it could be harder for some than others.
( article found)
Liz Johnson Artur is a Ghanaian-Russian photographer based in London, England. Her work documents the lives of black people from across the African Diaspora. Her work strives to display and celebrate the normal, the vibrant and the subtle nuances of each of these people lives that she encounters. Artur has taken photographs across Europe, America, Africa and the Caribbean for more than three decades. She calls this ongoing project the Black Balloon Archive, alluding to a 1970 song lyric by Syl Johnson that describes a black balloon ‘dancing’ in the sky, which is how Artur imagines her own movement when taking photographs. This exhibition focuses on London, where Artur has lived since 1991, capturing the richness and complexity of Black British life. “What I do is people,” Artur says of her work. “But it’s those people who are my neighbours. And it’s those people who I don’t see represented anywhere.” Artur shoots exclusively on film, and here her images are printed at various sizes, materialised using traditional photographic techniques onto paper as well as applications onto fabric, tracing paper and cardboard. Artur uses these different techniques in the workbooks she has regularly made since she first picked up a camera, and the exhibition functions as an expanded version of these ongoing journals.
