PV 17 August, 6-9pm 

Akua Afari | Loretta Campbell | Martine Hans-Jorie | Nikolle Hellis-McIntyre

The scars of our life help form our identity, hidden or otherwise we plan to explore

this through a plethora of unique and varied styles, medium techniques, and

processes.

There are many ways of portraying scars, some all decoration to beautify the face

and body, some scars identify, some are identity scars which belong to a tribe and of

course we all have emotional scars which we carry. These are sometimes hidden

and some scars are born from trauma, physical and mental; all of this will be

investigated within our own mediums.

 @combined_efx

Akua Afari

‘And What Of Our Terribly Beautiful Open Secret?’

Akua was born in 1978 to Ghanaian immigrant parents, she lives and works in

London. Since graduating in 2D Design (2002) she has used her multidisciplinary art

foundation to concentrate on graphic design, illustration, painting and photography.

Her art works are multi-layered and sit between stories, meditations, commentary

and contemplations on the black collective experience.

The starting point for this body of work for Akua Afari’s presentation of SCARZ is the

notion that scars are indication of healing having taken place to some extent. What is

healed but still remembered, what is healed and hidden to others, what is healed and

always known, what is healed and seen and unseen, what is healed and still felt?

Loretta Campbell

‘It’s Not What It Seems’

Throughout our lives we live with our mental scars, buried deep beneath the surface

of our subconscious. A place we don’t let our minds wonder to and if we do it can

unleash so much anguish and chaos. When I look into myself, I see all the emotional

pain, at times it can feel so traumatic I run. Thrust into the havoc of my mind, visibility

is limited, how far through all the layers will my mind take me before I can get out.

How do we control our pain? Some by mental blocking, others self-inflict pain as a

form of control that the pain can’t hurt us only oneself can.

These emotional wounds often don’t cause pain straight away but can linger for

many years only surfacing by certain triggers in our lives. This phase of my work has

quite a melancholic feel, the sadness of our emotional scars that the outside world is

oblivious.

Using printed words Loretta is expressing the trauma and anguish of emotional

scars. Different recycled materials are used to create a layering effect to represent

how deep the pain goes. The dress slits represent self-harming wounds and the pain

which is hidden from all but the desire to release the pain is what we see

Martine Hans-Jorie

‘Tribe’

The work shown by Martine Hans-Jorie shows a varied body of work through the

medium of charcoal, paint, fabric, and machine stitch. The artist uses these to

explore the beauty of the marks shown in scarring, also to re-imagine the African

variety of designs for scarring.

Following her visual investigations into the Igbo tribe's practice of Ichi scarification

worn by women, Igbo men usually wear Ichi on their faces. Martine discovered that

the male tribal marks, show that they hold high social class status. Igbo men who

have Ichi décor on their face are allowed to perform various rituals and give titles to

influential group members.

After the artists painted the Gar marks which are made by the Nuer people in

southwestern Ethiopia and Sudan. (A strip of six parallel horizontal lines is drawn

across the forehead. For the women, patterns are dotted across their skins.) she

discovered she liked the scars; they were beautifully crafted and seemed to enhance

the features of the face, however this could be done with face paint or make up

nowadays.

Despite some of the negative narrative's that surround scarring and scarification, it

continues to be used in Africa and in modern western society. Tattooing is also

commonplace in Europe.

Martine suggests this is also about identity, we allow ourselves to show how

important symbols, names and images are to ourselves and have the need to

communicate this to others. "I am exploring the visual beauty of scars not just, tribal

scars but emotional and physical scars. Applying my medium through mark making,

I am imagining what emotional scars would look like and the journey from the first

wound, the healing process, and the outcome of the perceived experience."

Nikolle Hellis-McIntyre

‘Beauty within the Scarz’

Once your spirit is broken then everything falls apart. A joyful heart is good

medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones. Most of us through life have

experienced scarring in one way or another. The scars that linger could be physical

or emotional or both, on our body or in our mind. Scars are like road maps of our

life, they show where we’ve been and where we are going and sometimes, we don’t

go anywhere for a long time. Just stuck. Not moving. Not healing.

But if we’re lucky enough to be able to heal, to close the wounds, there can be a

celebration of life after the scars have healed.

Nikolle’s work expresses the celebration of life after the scars have healed. Through

experimentation of media, painting, collage and digital she creates art that is

colourful and bold, of women who collectively have all been scarred in some way.

Whether through procedures, chemicals that woman put on their skin to lighten

themselves, to self-harming and abusiveness from others.