hilitehead

I fell in love with Wangechi Mutu’s art in college and continue to be inspired by her. Her new retrospective Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined at the New Museum represents the full breadth of her practice featuring painting, collage, drawing, sculpture, film, and performance. A motif that grounds all of Mutu’s works is a spiritual connection to African traditions. Through this she pays homage to the unifying power of shared mythologies and reclaims narratives that have been erased through colonization. With each floor of the museum, her narrative unfolded conjuring fantastical visions of a collective past and imagined future in the face of myriad modern humanitarian and ecological crises.

At once culturally specific and transnational in scope, Mutu’s work grapples with contemporary realities, while proffering new models for a radically changed future informed by feminism, Afrofuturism, and interspecies symbiosis.

I felt so moved having experienced such a large body of her work in one setting. I muse in her fantasy. She is a prolific creator, true to her craft and ever evolving. I feel lucky to have caught her retrospective. Always rooting for her, excited to see what comes next.