Olhar Do Outro – Délio Jasse
13 Jul, 2023 - 22 Sep, 2023
From Tuesday to Friday. 12 pm to 7 pm
Saturday 11 am to 7 pm
“The written word on the wall it’s just a sigh evasion flying the dream”.
“Freedom, it always exists beyond the wallsand the walls are only destroyed with the hands of the people”.
Costa Andrade
Olhar do outro is an installation made up of photographs, postcards, official documents, telegrams and stamps of varying sizes, printed on materials such as fabric, canvas and cardboard.
The artist declares: «This is my story of the lie that is told to us.» The exhibition was preceded by Nova Lisboa in 2018. Now, the artist gives Angola back to Angolans through his personal archive made public.
If, in colonial times, each territory had its official photographer, the truth is that this resulting look-identity, as well as its circulation, were always conditioned by political reasons. Who photographed? Who was photographed? Who stamped, vetoed or validated the decisions, the images, the actions? Who traveled and what did they carry? Who named the terror and who was its executing agent? Who had and still has access to history and memory? How has Angolan society’s relationship with self-image evolved since then, in terms of transparency, production and reflection?
The artist’s own personal archive can only be considered as such because, in addition to research and curatorship, an organization was added to it, a context of multiple layers of narratives. A puzzle of infinite combinations, from which we can now glimpse, if not the censored interior, all the other sides.
The forced mobility of photographs is the forced mobility of the geographies of the people portrayed in them. The presentation of these creations in an exhibition context guarantees democratization of access to the image. At a time when, all over the world, the return of stolen and looted artefacts is being increasingly assertively debated and negotiated, Délio Jasse proposes, as a photographer and archivist, «to bring the world indoors».
It is now up to the public to recognize and re-imagine themselves in this game of meanings and symbols. As Luandino Vieira teases us: «The painted/ bright/ fallen cloths/ showed the heart:/ — Luanda is here!»
Gisela Casimiro