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THE RAPE OF AFRICA DAVID LACHAPELLE REFLEX AMSTERDAM DAVID LACHAPELLE THE RAPE OF AFRICA
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THE RAPE OF AFRICA
THE RAPE OF AFRICA
Galerie Alex Daniels and Fred Torres Collaborations
Present
DAvID LACHAPELLETHE RAPE OF AFRICA
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Fantasy - crazy and brash, bright, loud
and glamorous. David LaChapelle’s
photographs have an instantly recog-
nizable look to them. His pictures evoke a
world of excess and exuberance, populated
by beautiful people who are flawless
and immaculate. When we look into his
compositions, we find ourselves adrift in
an ocean of fantasy.
David LaChapelle searches for beauty. He
is enraptured by it, obsessed with it. He
is captivated by the beauty of the human
body in much the same way as those Italian
painters and sculptors of the Renaissance
who took such delight in representing
the body. They allowed the light to shine
in and illuminate the naked human
form after centuries of religious prudery
had kept it in the darkness. One of
those artists was Sandro Botticelli, who
invented an eroticized ideal that still
holds us entranced half a millennium
after his death in 1510. His Venus and
Mars, now in London’s National Gallery,
Colin Wiggins, The National Gallery, London
Fantasy and truth
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What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?
John Keats: Ode on a Grecian Urn
1110
is iconic. It was painted in Florence in
about 1485 or so. Botticelli’s Venus, the
Goddess of Love, is one of those rare
beings, a beauty who no-one can remember
encountering for the first time. She seems
to have been in our consciousness forever.
According to legend, she is based upon the
celebrated Florentine Renaissance beauty
Simonetta Vespucci, who was famed for
her looks and was the tragic victim of an
early death. She was also, apparently, the
inspiration for the image of Venus in two
other great paintings by Botticelli that are
now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence: the
Birth of Venus and La Primavera.
Despite her position as a respectably
married woman, Botticelli was in love with
Simonetta, so the story goes. Nobody really
knows if any of this is true. It’s just part of
the enduring myth, although anyone with
an ounce of romance would wish it to be so.
In Botticelli’s painting, Venus is dressed
in a diaphanous white gown and is sitting
upright and wide awake. Her companion is
a total contrast. Male, naked and asleep, we
identify him by his armour and the weapons
that four little satyrs have borrowed from
him while he dozes. He is, of course, Mars -
the God of War.
War is the bringer of death, grief and
destruction. In Botticelli’s painting how-
ever, he is vanquished. Look at that floppy
hand. The limply dangling finger tells
you all you need to know about what lies
hidden beneath the drape just behind it.
Mars is spent. His proud lance is now a
plaything for the little satyrs who are about
to jolt him from his post-coital oblivion.
Sandro Botticelli: Detail: La Primavera, © Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY.
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The conch shell will sound a strident
blast and the god will suddenly wake to
find himself naked and humiliated, as the
fully dressed Venus looks on with cold
condescension. Her expression has a faint
hint of annoyance about it, as she fixes her
gaze on the god who has dared to fall asleep
on her. Botticelli’s message is plain. Mars
cannot keep up with Venus. He is disarmed
while she is in control. Love conquers war.
If only this were true.
But we all know that it is not. Back in the
real world, regular news reports of the child
soldiers of Africa horrify us. We read stories
of kidnappings, sometimes of dozens
of children at a time. They are drugged
and then forced to murder and mutilate.
We learn of endless and ancient conflicts
that have no meaning or purpose. These
conflicts are fuelled by weapons that flood
in from countries that consider themselves
civilized and advanced. We shudder for the
victims and then we put them out of our
minds and turn back to the gossip pages.
It is just so easy to fall into the belief that
Africa, the Dark Continent, is incurable.
In David LaChapelle’s response to Botticelli’s
painting there are three little black boys.
Two of them are playing with huge guns,
grim weapons of war, the weapons of Mars,
as if they are fashion accessories. To these
little lads, the weapons are toys to have fun
with, like the tiny trucks in the background
that are placed in an arid landscape.
These little toy trucks echo the huge
mechanical earth-mover that appears to
emerge menacingly from the direction
of Mars’s groin. Look and think carefully
because everything has a meaning. The jib
of the crane seems to carve out a kind of
negative pyramid. The pyramids are a great
African monument that are here nowhere
in sight. Instead there is emptiness.
David extends Botticelli’s game of contrast.
The Italian master opposes male and female,
asleep and awake, naked and clothed. To
this, David adds another opposite: black
and white. And in doing so he deftly changes
the image’s meaning. Mars, of course, is a
powerful European god.
He was worshipped in ancient Rome,
the ultimate empire of merciless, brutal
conquest. With the complicity of Mars,
the Romans brought peace and civilization
to barbarians: but only on their own
terms. Do as we tell you or be slaughtered.
The Romans worshipped Mars because
he was always on their side, as they
transported their enlightened values to the
backward tribes whose lands they invaded
and conquered. In David’s picture, Mars
slumbers peacefully. He is surrounded by
the trappings of conquest: bars of gold and
shiny trinkets, a gilded grenade and pistol.
A diamond encrusted skull. And tellingly, a
gilded bone.
It is these details that speak most eloquently
of the meaning of David’s picture. Look
again at the landscape behind, where the
little trucks are placed. It is dry and arid.
The little trucks continue to desecrate
it. The life that was once there, the trees,
the grass, the animals and the people,
have been scoured away from the surface
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Sandro Botticelli:
C. 1484, Venus and Mars
© The National Gallery,
London.
1716 David La Chapelle: watercolor, graphite, collage on paper - 20x23 cm | 2009
of a once beautiful world in a relentless
search for treasure. This search has a cost.
One of the most efficient methods of mining
gold involves the use of mercury, which
filters into watercourses and leaves its toxic
residue to destroy the lives of those who
ingest it. Bodies are withered, children are
born deformed and impaired. How ironic
that this poisonous metal takes its name
from another European god: Mercury.
He is the god of commerce and profit, one
more European son who arrives in Africa in
a ruthless search for gold. Gold with which
to gild the bones of the vanquished.
As if to emphasise his physical perfection,
Mars has a little wound on his cheek. It is
nothing too serious and nothing that won’t
heal. The little boy with the megaphone is
wearing a footballer’s helmet: maybe this
is all just a game after all. On the left sits
Venus. She is black. She is loaded with
all of those aspects of black beauty that
white Europeans have historically found so
compelling. She is exotic, rare and aloof.
Her jewellery, her painted nails, lavish
hairstyle and exposed breast all combine
to produce an image of rare fragility. She
is a black African woman seen through
European eyes and has been rendered
passive, tame and beautiful. In Botticelli’s
picture, Venus is in charge but in David’s
picture the lamb and the rooster that are
placed beside her indicate that she is, like
them, only a chattel. She has the same
status as a piece of livestock. And a lamb,
remember, is traditionally an animal of
sacrifice.
Mars, although asleep, is still in charge
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here. He can snooze away happily. He
doesn’t need his weapons anymore because
the little African boys will do his dirty work
for him. The boy with the megaphone will
wake him up but the god will simply look
around at his accumulated treasure and
reflect approvingly on how his weapons
bring the values of western enlightenment
to a continent where the light seems
permanently extinguished. The broken
light bulb in the top corner is useless and
dim: we hardly notice it in contrast to the
painfully bright strip-lights that sear across
the top of the picture. Here, it is the classical
European god Mars who rules things, not
the black African Venus. And he transports
the means of destruction to the hands of
innocents.
David LaChapelle’s ‘Rape of Africa’ is a
visual equivalent of Joseph Conrad’s short
novel of 1899, ‘Heart of Darkness’. There,
the appalling character Kurtz plunders
Detail: Sandro Botticelli, Venus and Mars Detail: David LaChapelle, The Rape of Africa
vast amounts of ivory to send back home.
Cleverly, the charismatic European fools
the native Africans into worshipping him
with their primitive rituals. To the Africans,
the white man becomes a god. Kurtz and
his fellow colonisers were motivated by
a desire to take African riches to Europe.
In exchange, from Europe to Africa they
brought what they saw as enlightenment.
With that enlightenment they brought
weapons. And today, their descendants still
bring weapons and, symbolising their own
enlightenment, they bring ‘Classic Sun:
Color safe Bleach.’ Yes, David LaChapelle is
deeply concerned with beauty but he is not
blind to its flip side, ugliness. Indeed, he
is as passionate about communicating the
existence of ugliness as he is about showing
us beauty. For Keats, author of the lines
quoted at the start of this essay, beauty and
truth are the same thing – ‘that is all Ye know
on earth, and all ye need to know’ – but he
got it wrong. Ugliness exists and that is the
truth too. Just think of those child soldiers.
Ugliness is the opposite of beauty. Fantasy
is the opposite of truth. Paradoxically
however, it is through his brilliant use of
beauty and fantasy that David LaChapelle
somehow and irresistibly arrives at the
truth. The ugly truth.
Colin Wiggins,
The National Gallery, London
By all ye cry or whisper, By all ye leave or do, The silent, sullen peoples Shall weigh your gods and you.Kipling; ‘The White Man’s Burden’
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THE RAPE OF AFRICA
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Afrika is een vrouw, zoals alle continenten
vrouwen zijn. Afrika is vanzelfsprekend
een zwarte vrouw en zo wordt ze al sinds
eeuwen verbeeld. Afrika is het rijkste
continent, Afrika is het armste continent,
het oercontinent, waar de natuur in volle
overvloed zijn gang gaat. Afrika is overdadig,
overrompelend, bedwelmend en barok: bij
uitstek het continent van David LaChapelle.
Lange tijd was Afrika een onbekende in de
Westerse kunst. Hooguit werd ze verbeeld
in de allegorische voorstellingen waar de
werelddelen verpersoonlijkt werden in
fresco’s en beeldengroepen in meestal grote
publieke gebouwen. Het mooiste voorbeeld
vinden we in Amsterdam, in het timpaan
van het voormalige stadhuis, tegenwoordig
Paleis op de Dam. De Republiek der
Nederlanden was in de zeventiende eeuw
immers Europa’s leidende mogendheid en
handelsnatie waar ook de kunsten bloeiden.
In het wereldbeeld van de Republiek stond
de Amsterdamse stedenmaagd centraal.
Amsterdam beschouwde zich als de stad
waarnaar alle werelddelen zich richtten., In de
wereldvoorstelling, gemaakt door Quellinus
de Oude zien we de zeegoden theatraal hulde
brengen aan de Amsterdamse Stedemaagd.
Wim Pijbes, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam
Onaangenaam comfort
David La Chapelle: graphite on paper - 23x20 cm | 2009
David La Chapelle: watercolor, graphite, collage on paper - 40x23 cm | 200926 27
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En op de achtergevel bewijzen de vier wereld-
delen de stad Amsterdam hun eer. Zo is op
dit centrale monument van onze Gouden
Eeuw het toenmalige wereldbeeld vereeuwigd.
Christendom, handel en zwaard gaan samen.
Stroomgoden op de voorgrond stellen IJ en
Amstel voor. Azië biedt juwelen en zijde aan,
Afrika ivoor en Arabië doek, in geknielde,
vragende houding. Met hun handelswaar
werden de continenten en dus ook Afrika,
afgebeeld als figuranten in een eurocentrisch
wereldbeeld, gezien en gedomineerd vanuit
Europa. In het toonaangevende werk van
Cesare Ripa, de Iconologia van eind zestiende
eeuw, kreeg deze beeldtaal verder vorm.
Europa werd voorgesteld als een vrouw met
kroon en scepter, Afrika als een exotisch
uitgedoste vrouw, Azie vaak in gezelschap
van een olifant en na de ontdekking van
Amerika, het vierde werelddeel, een vrouw
met veren getooid. Telkens keert een aantal
motieven terug: Europa, of meer specifiek
een land of stad, wordt gepersonifieerd als
vrouw, met klassieke trekken, in Romeins
gewaad en met een kroon. Zij domineert de
voorstelling. De werelddelen knielen voor
haar troon, zijn veelal vanaf de rug te zien
en qua gelaatsuitdrukking niet ‘klassiek’
afgebeeld, maar achtelozer van stijl. In deze
Europese beeldtraditie werd Azië afgebeeld
als een vrouw in een sierlijk gewaad versierd
met goud, parels en andere edelstenen en
Afrika werd vaak vergezeld door exotische
dieren als een leeuw, schorpioen en een
hoorn des overvloed die terugvoert tot de
tijd van Hadrianus toen Carthago een van
graanschuren van Rome was. Het moge
duidelijk zijn, Afrika stond voor barokke
overdaad. Maar feitelijk was Afrika tot ver
in de negentiende eeuw het onbekende
werelddeel. Op enkele handelsposten aan de
kust en gebieden aan de Kaap na, was het hele
enorme binnenland een ondoordringbaar
geheel wat pas met avonturiers als Stanley
werd geopend. Zijn beroemde reisverslag
‘Throught the Dark Continent’ (1878)
schonk enig licht in deze lange duisternis. In
de deling van Afrika, het grote landenspel dat
plaatsvond in Berlijn tussen 15 november
1884 en 26 februari 1885, waar de Europese
machthebbers de kaart van het ongerepte
werelddeel onderling in stukken verdeelden,
werd de basis gelegd voor de roof van Afrika.
Haar lot ligt sinds ‘Berlijn’ in Westerse
handen. Gaandeweg werden de natuurlijke
hulpbronnen, aanvankelijk ook de mensen
zelf, systematisch aan het vruchtbare
continent onttrokken ter meerdere glorie
van het Westen.
Nu naar David LaChapelle. We zien een
wakkere Afrika, een verleidelijk mooie zwarte
vrouw, geheel in de beeldtraditie die hiervoor
in het kort geschetst werd. De titel ‘The Rape
of Africa’ is echter een noviteit in de kunst.
We kennen wel de ‘Rape of Europe’ van
bijvoorbeeld Rembrandt of Botero en tal van
andere kunstenaars die dit klassieke thema
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uit Ovidius’ ‘Metamorphosen’ verbeelden.
Een ‘Rape of Africa’ bestaat echter niet.
Waar de roof van Europa een mythologisch
verhaal is, betekent de roof van Afrika eerder
een waar gebeurd drama dat opvallend
genoeg nooit tot inspiratie van kunstenaars
heeft geleid. Daar is met dit werk van
David LaChapelle nu op drastische wijze een
eind aan gemaakt. Gebaseerd op Botticelli’s
‘Venus en Mars’, lijkt de verbeelding van
LaChapelle een cynisch commentaar op de
wereldgeschiedenis. Een voldaan slapende
Mars (Europa?) omringd door rijkdom (met
zelfs een verwijzing naar Damien Hirsts’ ‘For
the Love of God’) en brutale, zwaar bewapende
handlangers, slaapt zijn roes uit in het bijzijn
van een afwezig kijkende zwarte Venus.
Deze Afrika zit ongenaakbaar en bevindt
zich in een voorstelling, waarvan ze geen deel
lijkt uit te maken. Haar onbewogen afwezig-
heid is niet apathisch, eerder souverein.
De kleurrijke overdadige ‘pop baroque’
van David LaChapelle leent zich bij uitstek
voor deze dramatische vertelling. Allerlei
tegenstellingen op verschillende niveaus
eisen tegelijk de aandacht; gekunstelde
esthetiek naast natuurlijke schoonheid, rust
en beweging, lawaai en stilte, comfort en
ongemak, oorspronkelijkheid en citaat. In
‘The Rape of Africa’ toont LaChapelle ons op
indringende wijze, gebaseerd op een klassiek
motief, een uiterst actueel onderwerp.
Wim Pijbes
Directeur Rijksmuseum
David La Chapelle: watercolor, graphite, collage on paper - 23x20 cm | 2009
32 33David La Chapelle: watercolor, graphite, collage on paper - 20x23 cm | 2009
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ColophonAll artworks: David LaChapelleEssay by Colin Wiggins, The National Gallery, LondonEssay by Wim Pijbes, Director Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Sandro Botticelli: Venus and Mars © The National Gallery, LondonSandro Botticelli: La Primavera, The Birth of Venus, © Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY.
Exhibition curated by Alex Daniels and Fred TorresCuratorial assistance Patrick Toolan
Book and cover design Alex Daniels, Reflex Editions, Amsterdam, 2009, all rights reserved.Image “The Rape of Africa” courtesy of David LaChapelle, Galerie Alex Daniels and Fred Torres Collaborations
Edition: 3000 Print: Meco Offset, The NetherlandsPrinted and Bound in The Netherlands
This is an edition of 3000 of which 250 are numbered and signed by the artist.All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without prior written permission from the copyright holders.ISBN/EAN: 9789071848070
Published on the occasion of exhibition
The Rape of Africa
Galerie Alex Daniels, Amsterdam
6 June - 31 July, 2009.
Weteringschans 83 1017 RZ Amsterdam
Openingstijden di t/m za 11.00 - 18.00 uur.
Tel. 020 - 627 28 32 / 020 - 423 54 23
www.reflexamsterdam.com
ColophonAll artworks: David LaChapelleEssay by Colin Wiggins, The National Gallery, LondonEssay by Wim Pijbes, Director Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Sandro Botticelli: Venus and Mars © The National Gallery, LondonSandro Botticelli: La Primavera, The Birth of Venus, © Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY.
Exhibition curated by Alex Daniels and Fred TorresCuratorial assistance Patrick Toolan
Book and cover design Alex Daniels, Reflex Editions, Amsterdam, 2009, all rights reserved.Image “The Rape of Africa” courtesy of David LaChapelle, Galerie Alex Daniels and Fred Torres Collaborations
Edition: 3000 Print: Meco Offset, The NetherlandsPrinted and Bound in The Netherlands
This is an edition of 3000 of which 250 are numbered and signed by the artist.All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without prior written permission from the copyright holders.ISBN/EAN: 9789071848070
Published on the occasion of exhibition
The Rape of Africa
Galerie Alex Daniels, Amsterdam6 June - 31 July, 2009David Desanctis Gallery, Los Angeles12 September - 31 October, 2009.
Weteringschans 83 1017 RZ Amsterdam
Openingstijden di t/m za 11.00 - 18.00 uur.
Tel. 020 - 627 28 32 / 020 - 423 54 23
www.reflexamsterdam.com
David DeSanctis Gallery
314 N. Crescent Heights Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90048
phone 323.782.9404 / fax 323.782.9407
www.desanctisgallery.com
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