Tiwani Contemporary presents Alignment of Values, a 15-part series of oil paintings by the Mozambican painter Gemuce. The exhibition is the artist’s first solo exhibition in London.
The starting point for Alignment of Values was an art/research project based on co-working practices between researchers and artists, conceived in 2010 at the Zentrum Moderner Orient in Berlin. The project, entitled In Search of Europe: Considering the Possible in Africa and the Middle East, examined the similarities between those from Africa, the Middle East and former Ottoman Empire and their desire to break free from the standards set by Europe’s international influence.
The professional encounters between Maputo-based Gemuce and Berlin-based anthropologist Vanessa Diaz Rivas developed into a friendship, which in turn became the basis of and the medium for their collaboration in this project. The 15 canvases in Alignment of Values present a diverse range of individuals in relation to a wall. The reactions to this wall vary, as some try to climb over it, others push against it, some attempt to destroy it, whilst others simply ponder its existence. The wall symbolises all the things that lie beyond one’s boundaries. This decision-making reflects each individual character dealing with his or her own limitations, imagined or perceived.
The experiences explored in this body of work express the concept of negotiation as the essence of all relationships (both between the artists and researchers, and Gemuce’s characters and the wall) whilst also offering a representation at a human and individual level of the wider issue of global socialisation.