The OCA organised a study visit on 11 February to see the
work of Ugandan born British photographer/film maker Zarina Bhimji.
Having not even heard of her before and not seen how film
can be used alongside stills in an exhibition, I was interested in going to see
how she used film narratives to explore her heritage and ancestry.
Bhimji was born in Uganda in 1963 to Indian parents and
moved to Britain in 1974 a couple of years after Idi Amin expelled the Asians
from the country. Landscapes and
buildings haunted by their layered past are the subjects for images.
The exhibition traces 25 years of her work including the
premiere of her latest film Yellow Patch
which was inspired by trade and migration across the Indian Ocean. Haveli palaces and the colonial offices in
Mumbai harbour provide the subjects for some close up painterly images together
with the desert, the sea and the boats which set the atmospheric scene for
several different journeys.
Out of Blue her
first film is included in this collection.
The film is a visual journey across the Ugandan countryside with the
sounds of fire, birds and humans.
However, in both her films there is a distinct lack of humans only the
traces that they were there, that the places she shows us were inhabited but
are now empty. It is almost as if the places she introduces us to has its own
story to tell us, the abandoned homes, the empty graveyard and the deserted
countryside. It is a narrative of the
Asians leaving Uganda, their homes and the breaking up of families.
The collection also includes a series of stills from Out of Blue and Yellow Patch along with other photographs. Bhimji made the decision to work with film
instead of digital as she felt it gave her more depth and achieved the artistic
effects she wanted to achieve. This can
be seen very much in her photographs from the series titled Love with the saturated colours and
painterly effect.
Her decision to move away from still images and into film
was because she felt that her images and subjects had more to say and needed a
different medium that would allow for this. To be honest, I didn’t know what to
expect when I sat down to watch Out of
Blue. The museum guide had spoken about the disjointed sound and the lack
of people in her films. This is
something we are not used to. I wondered
how she achieved a 25 minute film in this way.
The impact was almost instantaneous.
From the beginning the booming sound set the dark and eerie atmosphere
that something was not right, it invoked a sense of fear.
The image titled
Frightened Goats from Love stood
out to me. Here we could see a series of
graves near a small building which looked like a house. Some of these looked half dug. The sense of abandonment in this image is
very strong. There are no people. This is what remains when people are forced
away from their families and the graves of their parents. This is the void that is left after
expulsion.
Illegal Sleep is
an image of a row of rifles laid up against a wall taken from Out of Blue. I liked the colour in this image. In the film this images comes to life as we
see the shadows of people walking past the guns. This drives a fear through us. These guns come to life with the introduction
of man. Her work is very much about the
echo it creates rather than bare faced facts.
Polaroids from her research were also displayed. As I am now studying narrative and looking at
my workflow I found it very interesting to see work from her lengthy recces and
insight into the way she worked.
Her work commissioned by Harewood House examined the hidden
histories of black people and the slave trade.
I especially liked the mirrors that contained etched newspaper copy
about the details of the servants that ran away. We are all forced to look at ourselves and
those around us as we read.
Other images in this collection made use of transparency
lightboxes which gave a surreal effect.
She Loved to Breathe – Pure Silence combined black and white
photographs with the colourful spices, turmeric and chilli powder which was
arranged on the floor. This work
comments on the controversial immigration protocols in Britain during the
1970s.
Before I visited this exhibition I would say I had never
considered using film for a narrative.
Since the visit I can’t help but think of ways it could work alongside
my work and my interests. Being Irish
and having experienced the abandoned countryside in the 80s due to widespread emigration, I can see the beauty in the land which has its haunted layered
histories from invasion, independence, civil war, immigration and most recently
from boom to bust. Maybe one day I will
dare to explore this further.
More information:
Clip from Out of Blue
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