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Cristina de Middel
This is What Hatred Did
September 24 November 7, 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday September 24, 6 8pm
Hours: Tuesday Friday 11am 5pm, Saturday 12 5pm
Cristina de Middel blends documentary and conceptual photographic practices to create a series of photographs, which offers a contemporary interpretation of the 1954 novel “My Life in the Bush of Ghosts,” by acclaimed Nigerian writer Amos Tutuola.
Influenced by Yoruba traditions and folklore, Tutuolas story is narrated by a young boy who escapes an attack on his village by entering into a forbidden bush inhabited by ghosts. Through mythological tales of the boys haunted and often violent journey to reunite with his family, the author addresses themes of war, religion, displacement and the diversity of cultures in his native region of Abeokuta.
Created in 2014, “This is What Hatred Did” reconfigures the bush, characters, and traditional imagery of Tutuolas story with the people and architecture of the Lagosian neighborhood of Makoko. Once an 18th-century fishing village on stilts, it is now a floating slum with its own rules, infamously deemed the Venice of Africa. De Middels photographs shift between staged depictions of otherworldly figures and happenings, to street portraits and moments of the everyday, blurring the lines between reality and fiction. Like Tutuola, de Middel is interested in taking meaning from ancient stories and myth to help navigate the complex issues of the region.
Cristina de Middels work investigates photographys ambiguous relationship to truth. Blending documentary and conceptual photographic practices, she plays with reconstructions and archetypes that blur the line between reality and fiction. After a successful career as a photojournalist, de Middel stepped outside of the photojournalistic gaze. She produced the critically acclaimed series The Afronauts in 2012, which explored the history of a failed space program in Zambia in the 1960s through staged reenactments of obscure narratives.
De Middel has exhibited extensively internationally and has received numerous awards and nominations, including PhotoFolio Arles 2012, the Deutsche Brse Prize, POPCAP 13, and the Infinity Award from the International Center of Photography in New York. De Middel lives and works in Mexico.
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