Third Wave
Store Review (0)PRESENTED BY : Gemma Hart
| Frame | None |
|---|---|
| Medium | Mutton cloth, computer keys, crosheen knit thread and found objects |
| Height | 300.00 cm |
| Width | 300.00 cm |
| Artist | Maurice Mbikayi |
| Year | 2022 |
'Third wave' (2022) is a reference to COVID-19. Maurice Mbikayi’s mixed media work draws on Michel Foucault’s idea of ‘Heterotopias’. Contextually connected to ‘utopia’, it is a theoretical opposite. Both ideas operate as intellectual exterior sites which are connected to other sites through a process of inversion or mirroring. In explaining his experience of the pandemic, Mbikayi describes how “we were separated but also connected because of the internet”. In a sense, part of the experience was at odds with the other. In the piece, he presents an amalgamation of perspectives.
Balls of computer keys representing modern connection and communication are
fastened to a fabricated wave. Mbikayi used a three-meter loom to weave the fabric together. Once constructed, he attached the piece to a wall and then shaped the cloth. The bulbous yellow and plum forms are illustrative of the disease mutating over time. The undulating peaks and dips carry the viral load. The work speaks to voyaging, migration and water as a vehicle.
