SIMOHAMMED FETTAKA: IDENTITY AND RIGHT OF CHOICE.
By Nii B. Andrews.
Simohammed Fettaka in his current practice focuses on cartography and unveils it as a tool to divide humanity by those who wield power.
He translates this as being based on history with a result that structures of domination have been installed where wealth is appropriated and oftentimes violence is also unleashed.
For Fettaka there are two groups of humanity: the priveleged- who can traverse the globe physically and mentally unhindered; and the herd- deconstructed to flesh, without a voice in a putrid sea of hopelessness.
Perhaps more graphically illustrated thus: those with passports and those with stopports. The categorization of course arbitrarily arrived at by those at the “center”.
As a result, the artist sees the Mediterranean as the divide – and he is unscathing in referring to it as a place of humiliation and death…..a place where human beings are reduced to animality.
He summons a mermaid or mythical water creature as a witness to the recent all too frequent macabre events in the Mediterranean Sea.
The map makers or cartographers consistently designate parts of the globe as the abode of the “Other”…..those who must be kept in check with unwieldy regulations, obnoxious petty officials and thinly disguised bigotry.
But Fettaka offers a triumphant redemption based on the indomitable nature of the human mind and spirit.
History is of course replete with this lesson; the triumph of freedom even against the wishes and machinations of powerful men…and sometimes women.
After viewing his current exhibition “WATER MAPS AND REALITY”, it is evident that this multidisciplinary artist utilizes a powerful visual aesthetic to address some of the monumental questions of today.
** Simohammed Fettaka.
WATER MAPS AND REALITY
EXHIBITION; FEB 21 – APRIL 22 2019.
COMPTOIR DES MINES GALLERY, MKCH.