BILI BIDJOCKA
In his diverse body of work, Bili Bidjocka frequently explores issues such as colonialism, race and identity through works that physically confront the spectator with the experience of dislocated time or the imbrications of the body and memory.
The menacing installation Dark Continent (1998) , made for the Grahamstown festival in collaboration with South African artist Kendall Geers, drew on excerpts from Francis Ford Coppola's film, Apocalypse Now (1979) , itself based on Joseph Conrad's lurid tale of colonialism, Heart of Darkness (1902) . Through these references, multiple layers of history - of colonialization, of war, of terror - are evoked. The installation, situated in the bowels of a building haunted by its own colonial history, was very dark, uncomfortably hot and accompanied by an increasingly disturbing soundtrack. Translucent oversized dresslike forms were suspended from the ceiling, while words such as: "pride/humility", "Terrifying simplicity" or "I was wrong, I was right," lined the ghostly forms. This work was reminiscent of Bidjocka's earlier piece, Explicit Lyrics (1995) , which also used the power of language and such floating forms to implicate the viewer in the installation.
Bidjocka's unusual project. The Jet-lag Experiment (2000) , which has served as the basis for several related versions, obliquely extends many of his preoccupations. The artist required viewers to remain in an enclosed space for 24 hours where all amenities (food and drink, toilet and washing facilities) were provided, and where paintings by fellow artists were displayed alongside a projection of Mont St. Victoire filmed over the course of 24 hours. The French mountain,famous for the obsessive fascination it held for Cézanne, is a symbol for painting and for the entire history of modernism in art that Cézanne would inaugurate. Participants in the experiment,who become 'performers' by virtue of their 24-hour visit, experienced a radical shift in temporality: inside the exhibition space they watched the sun rising above Mount St. Victoire, while outside night was falling. The work is about the temporality of painting - the "jet-lag' between an object and experience - but also about attention and how it can shift our perception of what is real. Visitor's are made to endure something at once visual and visceral, an experience that confronts one with a sense of dislocation and rupture as reality and fiction blur: -B.V./E.F.
http://www.dialnsa.edu/iat97/johannesburg/alt_currents/bidjocka.html
http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=66B7E5E5-FC2E-4C91-9764B58C8C634D3A
http://www.lookingglass.be/en/past/expo_01.html
http://www.newmuseum.org/more_exh_los_carpinteros.php
http://www.usfcam.usf.edu/Crossing/CrossBB.html
http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/reviews/mason/mason10-30-4.asp
http://people.africadatabase.org/en/person/13153.htmlhttp://www.universes-in-universe.de/specials/africa-remix/bidjocka/s-img-02.htm
Born 1962 in Douala, Cameroon
Lives and works in Brussels, Belgium and Paris, France
Video still at 2:04:00
Mont Staint Victoire, France at 2 PM
Mont Staint Victoire, France at 2 PM
In his diverse body of work, Bili Bidjocka frequently explores issues such as colonialism, race and identity through works that physically confront the spectator with the experience of dislocated time or the imbrications of the body and memory.
The menacing installation Dark Continent (1998) , made for the Grahamstown festival in collaboration with South African artist Kendall Geers, drew on excerpts from Francis Ford Coppola's film, Apocalypse Now (1979) , itself based on Joseph Conrad's lurid tale of colonialism, Heart of Darkness (1902) . Through these references, multiple layers of history - of colonialization, of war, of terror - are evoked. The installation, situated in the bowels of a building haunted by its own colonial history, was very dark, uncomfortably hot and accompanied by an increasingly disturbing soundtrack. Translucent oversized dresslike forms were suspended from the ceiling, while words such as: "pride/humility", "Terrifying simplicity" or "I was wrong, I was right," lined the ghostly forms. This work was reminiscent of Bidjocka's earlier piece, Explicit Lyrics (1995) , which also used the power of language and such floating forms to implicate the viewer in the installation.
Bidjocka's unusual project. The Jet-lag Experiment (2000) , which has served as the basis for several related versions, obliquely extends many of his preoccupations. The artist required viewers to remain in an enclosed space for 24 hours where all amenities (food and drink, toilet and washing facilities) were provided, and where paintings by fellow artists were displayed alongside a projection of Mont St. Victoire filmed over the course of 24 hours. The French mountain,famous for the obsessive fascination it held for Cézanne, is a symbol for painting and for the entire history of modernism in art that Cézanne would inaugurate. Participants in the experiment,who become 'performers' by virtue of their 24-hour visit, experienced a radical shift in temporality: inside the exhibition space they watched the sun rising above Mount St. Victoire, while outside night was falling. The work is about the temporality of painting - the "jet-lag' between an object and experience - but also about attention and how it can shift our perception of what is real. Visitor's are made to endure something at once visual and visceral, an experience that confronts one with a sense of dislocation and rupture as reality and fiction blur: -B.V./E.F.
http://www.dialnsa.edu/iat97/johannesburg/alt_currents/bidjocka.html
http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=66B7E5E5-FC2E-4C91-9764B58C8C634D3A
http://www.lookingglass.be/en/past/expo_01.html
http://www.newmuseum.org/more_exh_los_carpinteros.php
http://www.usfcam.usf.edu/Crossing/CrossBB.html
http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/reviews/mason/mason10-30-4.asp
http://people.africadatabase.org/en/person/13153.htmlhttp://www.universes-in-universe.de/specials/africa-remix/bidjocka/s-img-02.htm