Until 9 January 2022, the exhibition 'Vocal Motifs’ with work by Alia Ali will be on show in Contour Gallery in Rotterdam. This multidisciplinary artist is a true global citizen. She was born in Austria to a Yemeni-American father and a Bosnian mother, she’s traveled to more than 60 countries and has lived in no fewer than seven countries. It is therefore not surprising that in her work, the artist focuses on cultures around geographical intersections. She grew up in a family full of linguists, a fact that has strongly influenced her work. Her practice includes photography, video and installation and it deals with language, race, gender, the complexities of diaspora identities, geopolitical histories and imperialism. This week, during Art Miami Week, Alia will be presented as one of the twenty emerging talents of the Artsy Vanguard Prize 2021.
Indigenous fabrics and fabric patterns are a recurring theme in her work, because they are often a reflection of migration patterns and underlying conflicts, power relations and histories. Ali: “Textile unites and divides us, both physically and symbolically.” Although the indigenous fabrics in Ali's work have a regional background, their production has often been scaled up to a global scale — in many cases because they have been appropriated by Western producers. The artist considers indigenous textiles to be a unique document in which politics, economics and history collide.
Consider the famous and visually cheerful Vlisco fabrics, which can be seen in her “Flux” series. These fabrics expose a colonial history and exploitation that is woven into the making process. The brightly coloured fabrics have become an integral part of the historic and contemporary West African street scene, but these wax fabrics have been shipped from the Netherlands since 1876. For this, the Dutch textile company Vlisco appropriated colouring methods from Javanese batik printers from their colonies: the Dutch East Indies. The prints were stripped of existing symbolism and printed in the Netherlands with a modified banknote printer, nicknamed 'La Javanaise'. African countries formed a market for these products. This balance of power has created a strange situation: because these prints are copyrighted, they cannot be freely used (without paying a fee) by the people from the culture where these prints originate from. Today, the prints are frequently copied in countries such as China. Vlisco's marketing campaign is surprising to say the least: they claim that they make 'The True Original'. It shows how colonialism can lead to a dilution of indigenous culture.
Ali uses these materials to create layered photographic sculptures and installations. She shows characters wrapped in fabric who, on the one hand, become invisible through camouflage, and on the other become hyper-visible — while showing that there are actual people hiding behind these histories. The characters reflect the proximity of fabrics, which are often worn directly on the skin. But the cheerful colours and prints also conceal the dark histories behind these fabrics. Ali has personal contact with the craftspeople behind these textiles, who teach her more about the meanings and processes behind the fabrics, patterns and pigments. She also applies traditional elements herself, by upholstering the works from several series by hand. The only thing that remains identical is the photo, set in a unique frame. The artist works in different series. The series “Flux” is about the Ivory Coast, “Migration” about Senegal and “Flow” about Ikat fabrics from Uzbekistan. The “Indigo” series, on the other hand, is about the ways in which different cultures from around the world have used natural blue indigo dye.
The series “Borderland”, which can also be seen in the exhibition in Contour Gallery, is about Yemen: the motherland of her father. Ali's work reflects the issues that many people from a diaspora face: how do you feel connected to your country of origin when you are physically separated from it? In Ali's case, this is reinforced by the fact that her roots lie in a civil war-ravaged country which, in the words of the UN, is the backdrop to the world's worst humanitarian crisis right now. Currently, 80% of Yemen's population depends on humanitarian aid. How do you identify with your roots when this culture is slowly being wiped out? Her mother's side of the family also experienced violence: her Bosnian relatives had to flee their homeland during the Bosnian genocide of 1995.
In addition to photographs, Ali also makes video works about Yemen. These works are described as "Yemeni-futurism", a reference to the term "Afrofuturism". In Afrofuturism, the Black experience and diaspora are reimagined by Black artists, academics, musicians and activists. This creates a new cultural expression with elements from fantasy, mysticism, science fiction and (Black) history — effectively a rejection of (neo)colonialism. In addition to the art world, Afrofuturism is also reflected in popular culture, in films such as Black Panther and Janelle Monáe's video clips. Yemeni-futurism has the potential to do the same for Yemeni heritage.
Ali received a bachelor's degree in Studio Art and Middle Eastern studies from Wellesley College and a master's degree in photography from the California Institute of the Arts. Today, she divides her time between Los Angeles, New Orleans and Marrakech. The artist completed residencies in the USA, Vietnam, Japan, Mexico and Morocco and her work has been included in the collections of, among others, The British Museum, Princeton University, the New Orleans Museum of Art and the KRC collection. Her award-winning work has appeared in the Financial Times, Le Monde, Elle, Vogue, Hyperallergic and Harper's Bazaar Arabia, and she has lectured at Harvard and LACMA, among others.
The exhibition 'Vocal Motifs' will be on show in Contour Gallery in Rotterdam until 9 January 2022.