Oreste Zevola was born in Naples in 1954 and passed away prematurely in 2014. His ashes are kept in the dog shelter… — an act of his profound love for dogs, but also an element which, together with others, points to animism as one of the guiding threads running through his work.
In this article, I will limit myself to analyzing Zevola’s works created during a few residencies in Africa: Tue moi ce soir, described on the website as a “pictorial reportage of the capital of the Central African Republic,” and the SIDA Centrafrique project, carried out with the doctor Philippe Gabrié.
As Marina Gargiulo — the artist’s life partner and director of the Oreste Zevola Archive — writes, Zevola’s African projects were born in Paris during his involvement with the Galerie Maï Ollivier. In 2000, Zevola lived in Salo, a small town in the Central African Republic. There, along with four other artists, he took part in a residency that concluded in 2001 with the exhibition Quatrième parallèle (Ollivier 2001).
Today, the Galerie Maï Ollivier is no longer active (1). However, traces of it can still be found online, including on a webpage where Victor Bissengué — anthropologist and writer — wrote on June 13, 2001:
The Maï Ollivier Gallery aims to be a space that is open to contemporary African sensibilities, without forgetting the creations that connect or resemble one another to the point of forming a symbiosis. During visits to the gallery or encounters at lively events (outside the Maï Ollivier Gallery), one can see and touch surprising objects: sand on woven raffia mats, pieces of paper, bits of cardboard or worked metal scraps, photographs, reproductions of objects in real-life miniature scale […] Maï Ollivier travels extensively — through cities, the countryside, the dense forests of the Pygmies, or along Africa’s rivers such as the Oubangui and the Ouellé. She needs to come into contact with things to feel them more deeply and then be able to share them with others. She is constantly searching for rare or little-known birds… (2)
On the same webpage, an article published in the magazine Africa International (no. 334, May 2000) is mentioned, providing more details about the residency in Salo and describing its context:
Creating an artists’ residency in the heart of the virgin forest: an innovative challenge, made possible through the help of multiple partners, both institutional and private. The basic artistic concept is to have African and Western artists work together and then exhibit their works in Africa.
For this innovative project, eight artists of different nationalities dared to take on the adventure: Samuel Fosso, a Central African photographer of Cameroonian origin; Etienne Jacobée and Jean Lamore, French sculptors; Siaké Mafoi and Ernest Wengaï, Central African visual artists; Salifou Lindou and Joël Mpah Dooh, Cameroonian painters; and another painter, Oreste Zevola, Italian. They flew to Salo on January 4.
Salo, a ‘wild’ village located in the far southwest of the Central African Republic, 450 km from Bangui, on the border between Congo and Cameroon, deep within the Sangha M’baéré primary forest. Living conditions were therefore harsh: no running water, no electricity, and at times a hostile environment. Nevertheless, for twenty days, with the logistical support of the Sesam company, the eight men compared their different artistic approaches to create new, strong, and coherent works. The nature of the materials used played an important role in the originality of the concept: wood, moss, straw, earth — in short, all the treasures that the natural environment had to offer were used.
The creations, surprisingly harmonious with one another, were inaugurated on Wednesday, January 26, in the presence of several notable figures, including the Central African Minister of Culture, Ms. Songomali; the French Minister of Cooperation, Mr. Charles Josselin; and the Director of the French Cultural Center in Bangui, Mr. Pierre Boitier. The many sponsors of the project welcomed this artistic ensemble with such enthusiasm that there is already talk of making this residency a permanent one.
It is possible to see the works born from this first collaboration, as they will be exhibited in Douala, at the Man Gallery, in April and May 2000, and later in Paris, at the Maï Ollivier Gallery, in June and July of the same year. (2)
Clarification 1: Etienne Jacobée is a French sculptor, and Jean Lamore is an American sculptor.
Clarification 2:
- For the Man Gallery in Douala, the exhibition will take place at the end of June 2000 (and not in May 2000);
- Moreover, it will not be held in Paris at the Maï Ollivier Gallery, but rather in Lille, as part of the event African Contemporary Art and Mission 2000, from September to December 2000.
The residency in Salo was organized by Maï Ollivier, who invited eight artists (Samuel Fosso, Ernest Weangai, Siaket Mafoi, Salifou Lindou, Joel Mpah Dooh, Jean Lamore, Etienne Jacobée, and Oreste Zevola) to draw inspiration and material resources — from the plant fibers of the jungle to urban scrap metal — from the very place where they would reside for twenty-five days.
In the residency’s catalogue, Jean Lamore praises the farsighted Maï Ollivier for having created a “place of cultural convergence,” “a unique experience in the history of contemporary art: an attempt to establish a kind of clandestine laboratory in which, in a country that had only recently emerged from an exhausting conflict, not only relationships among the creators themselves were experimented with, but also those between the natural site and a living, almost self-sufficient local population, bearer of an incredible human richness” (Lamore 2001: 6–7).
Marina Gargiulo writes again: “Four years later, in 2004, Zevola returned to the Central African Republic, this time for a personal project made possible through the support of the Alliance Française of Bangui and its director, Alexandre Martinez. The project, titled Tue moi ce soir, gathers a series of tempera paintings on canvas created over the course of a year, during two stays in Africa, exploring themes of everyday life in the capital and local legends.
This first African project, chronologically speaking — Tue moi ce soir — is visibly imbued with local visual culture. The colors of Zevola’s panels recall those of the Central African urban landscape: generally warm tones — greens, reds, yellows — which we will also find in the panels of his anti-AIDS project. They evoke the dirt roads, the painted shacks, the traditional garments. There are explicit references to shop signs, bars, and barbershops (3), not only in the colors and shapes but also in the inscriptions within the works: catchy phrases taken from the names of bars and taverns, which in turn borrow titles from songs (Tue moi ce soir, Dis moi tout) and films (S’en fout la mort) that Zevola had seen on storefront signs.
The arrangement of “objects” within the panels suggests references to primitivism and to the non-perspectival nature of African visual culture, which resonate with the postmodern parataxis that nourishes all of Zevola’s work. In a spatial construction foreign to the logic of Western Renaissance perspective, the objects are arranged on a two-dimensional plane as icons of an emotional map — as hieroglyphs, infographic symbols, figures from Pompeian frescoes, or “simple” shop sign decorations.
It is clear that this is an act of appropriation, yet one carried out with respectful lightness and empathy — qualities that were completely absent from primitivism and postmodern narcissism. In primitivism, there was at best a curiosity toward the exotic dimension, which took shape through the appropriation of exotic forms within the Western consumption of art.”
The notion of appropriation is a category introduced by anthropologists Marcus and Myers in 1995 to highlight the homogenization of differences present in certain artistic practices that make use of other cultural materials: “This assimilation of difference is generally carried out by stripping cultural materials of their original context or by using representations of that context in such a way as to frame its influence within the activities and interests of art production” (Marcus and Myers 1995: 33).
Arnd Schneider, the first anthropologist to emphasize and study the relationship between anthropology and contemporary art, devoted considerable attention to the topic of appropriation, noting, for instance, that the term has, in common usage, a negative connotation — one that assumes culture has its original location within a specific society, and that all other versions are inauthentic copies (Schneider 2006: 23). Yet, as we well know, “original authenticity” exists only as a cultural invention — which is why Marcus and Myers proposed replacing appropriation with circulation.
Schneider and Wright distinguish between artists who use appropriation in a soft mode and those who employ it in a hard mode. The former use other cultures in a superficial and merely “aesthetic” way, without concern for the cultural meanings they convey, whereas the latter (hard) use collaborative methods in which the meaning of the “appropriative” work is neither neglected nor distorted, but rather shared with the “owners” of the culture. In any case, Schneider and Wright consider such typologies unhelpful: “This formal approach would not resolve the problem of the artist’s original intentions or the transformation within the artist’s work, nor would it address the relationship the artist establishes with others. We must then ask ourselves: What happens in the process of appropriation?” (Schneider and Wright 2006: 39–40).
From the perspective of appropriation, where does Zevola’s work in Africa fit? His empathetic gaze, collaborative approach, and awareness that the “material” he uses for his panels is not an “authentic African original,” but rather a reworking of Western consumerism that Africans themselves draw upon, protect him from the “soft” typology of appropriation and from naïve primitivism. Ultimately, the images he appropriates are returned (almost) in the same language as the “original.” In Zevola’s panels, there is no narrative or discourse — the objects seem to have been tossed like dice into space, remaining as provisional coagulations of life, interpretable within a postmodern poetics in which, if a story exists, it must be reconstructed from isolated tropes, traces of events vibrating upon the skeleton of a history. This resonates with the a-perspectival nature of so-called “primitive” art — from Africa to Japan — which, rather than privileging morphological verisimilitude or realism, emphasizes the relationships between objects.
The end of grand narratives — identified by Lyotard as a defining trait of postmodernity — is portrayed, among many, by Zevola’s work. The images unfurl across the panels like figures on Greek vases, parodying myth without recounting it, leaving the observer free to navigate within the image, creating subjective narrative paths — or letting the figures bounce off one another, generating an attractive motion.
The figures are playful, naïve, and pleasing — they do not claim to reveal eternal truths but simply to arouse curiosity. Was it not curiosity, rather than a genuine desire for knowledge, that fueled the primitivist interest at the beginning of the last century? Robert Goldwater, writing about Maurice de Vlaminck — considered the first to own an African sculpture in 1904 — observes: “In Vlaminck’s appreciation of African sculpture, there is still something of this attitude, such that he is partly attracted to them for their strangeness and curiosity, rather than for their qualities as works of art” (Goldwater 1986: 88) (4).
All of Zevola’s work bears the mark of the Neapolitan transavanguardia of the 1980s. Chia, Cucchi, Paladino, and Zevola seem to speak a common language. One may consider, for example, Untitled – Souvenir by Mimmo Paladino (1993). Postmodernity and African a-perspectivism meet on the terrain of narrative deconstruction — the reduction of syntax to parataxis, the disintegration of language into visually pleasing stammers, like euphonious guttural sounds devoid of meaning. The icons distributed throughout the image do not share the same space; they derive from observations of objects in different places and converge on the panel according to the author’s emotional and mental associations.
Let us look at Tue moi ce soir (image above). Interior and exterior coexist on the same plane; the fence is not a true separation between inside and outside, but rather a decorative element — everything is simultaneously decorative, symbolic, and autonomous! “Tue moi ce soir! Mange moi avec toutes les sauces du monde!” is the cry — as desperate as it is self-ironic — of a man in love trying to impress his beloved. Look at the image: the figures are suspended, as if inscribed in emptiness, floating — the tilted tables are proof of this, but they also communicate instability, precariousness, perhaps the aftermath of a brawl or a flight, where the tables continue to sway.
The series of panels Tue moi ce soir takes its name, as Zevola writes, “from the sign of a Bangui wine cellar. The image referring to that place, and the others that make up the series, were inspired by that flow, which, starting from a simple everyday life mixed with legends still so present in daily experience, guided me through a city that lives in the paradox of a real identity, confronted and contaminated by the allure and the differences of distant and inaccessible countries. In the coexistence of old and new, of poverty and consumerism, lie the peculiarities of this distant yet contemporary world, which manages to make of the very symbols of a consumerism denied to it an original reworking — ‘stealing’ words, objects, and icons from a faraway Europe.” (Zevola 2005: 93).
“Air France” (above) is a kind of map: two territories — Paris and Bangui — connected by an Air France airplane. On one side and the other, simple symbols: the Arc de Triomphe, the Eiffel Tower, the mechanized “civilization” of France; while on the right, a crocodile, a tree, a lake — the wild and dangerous nature of Central Africa. Comic art, graphic design, and infographics combine to form an emotional map in which the Neapolitan artist inscribes two key places in his life: Paris and Bangui.
“La mère des pierres” is also organized like an emotional map. On the right appears the colonial name of the Central African Republic, Oubangui-Chari (5), which also refers to the city of Bangui itself. Then there is the word Capitaine written on what seems to be a wooden fish, a car loaded with luggage driving along a river — surely the Oubangui River, which runs along the southern edge of the city.
From another perspective, the disjointed figures portray a dilapidated city, in ruins. The ochre, beige, and light brown tones are the colors of the city — of the dirt roads, of the sunbaked bricks from which the houses are made. On this subject, the description by France and Rongier provides a snapshot of a heterogeneous urban environment: “The use of identical materials may suggest constructional uniformity, but this is not the case. There exist numerous variations, corresponding to equally diverse conditions of daily life — in the surface, the number of rooms, doors, and windows, the presence or absence of external structures such as kitchens, showers, and terraces. The quantity and nature of household objects and kitchen utensils reflect the unequal relationship individuals have to consumption. These differences are visible within clusters of houses whose owners are linked by close kinship: a small two-room dwelling where the wife cooks outdoors on the traditional three stones beside her husband’s family home — a six-room house with terrace and adjoining buildings.” (France and Rongier 1981: 99)
Zevola returned to the Central African Republic in 2011 and then in 2012, where, in collaboration with the Institut Pasteur and the Alliance Française of Bangui, he organized workshops for children — raising their awareness of health issues, letting them express themselves through drawings, and using their images to produce health support materials (such as vaccination booklets)” (Gargiulo 2019).
His meeting at the Alliance Française of Bangui with Philippe Gabré — a French doctor engaged in the fight against AIDS — became the driving force behind the project Face au SIDA, 18 digital graphic works accompanied by short phrases referring to the prevention of the terrible disease. Zevola’s work, together with a series of analogous works by Central African artists, was presented in April 2006 at the Alliance Française of Bangui.
SIDA Centrafrique, in addition to 18 digitally elaborated panels, includes 14 photographs taken in Bangui and a text by Philippe Gabré, the doctor who persuaded the artist to participate in the AIDS awareness campaign. On this occasion, Zevola worked, as he himself stated in an interview, “taking into account the traditions and beliefs of Central African society. Doctors and local social service workers choose the different themes .” (Felisatti 2008: 46).
The project also included the production of prints, posters, stickers, t-shirts, and notebooks that contributed to spreading information about the AIDS awareness campaign (6). The images, printed on postcards, t-shirts, and notebook covers, were distributed “in the busy streets of the capital or in high schools. Finally, to involve as many people as possible in the project, the Alliance Française organized a workshop, mobilizing local artists to create additional images on the same themes” (Felisatti 2008: 47). She further adds: “Central Africans are used to seeing advertising everywhere. As for the media used in the campaign — especially the posters — they were seen differently. Captivated by the graphic design, people attributed artistic value to it. They were no longer advertising materials but works of art. They were proud to display the posters on the façades of their shops and protected them from vandalism. Sometimes they would carefully remove them to keep them afterward” (ibid.).
Zevola’s website also published the press release and a short article by Tiziana Cozzi from La Repubblica, in which the artist recounts: “The slogans were suggested by doctors and field workers. I created about twenty icons symbolizing different issues: blood transfusions, sexual violence, the importance of certain medicines, motherhood, marital fidelity, and the belief that AIDS is a form of witchcraft. I hope my images can contribute, even in a small way, to understanding the dynamics of contagion, and thus to accepting treatment.”
The drawings communicate through a simple, symbolically direct language — such as death represented by skulls hovering around figures often inspired by the signs of local barbershops.
The language is simple and direct — like a razor blade between two skulls signaling the risk of transmission, or a syringe in a skull’s mouth, a skull inside a condom, or little birds perched on hearts protecting a couple inside a large condom.
But what gives meaning to the project — what opens a space where art, participation, sharing, and social goals intertwine — is the dissemination of the digital prints among the people. The photographs showing the use of these prints are not merely direct evidence of the relationship between the artist and the local community, or of the social communication involved in the project, but rather an essential part of the entire operation. Thus, they are not mere photographic documentation, but a narrative element coherently structured within the project itself.
Zevola’s images — displayed on shop fronts, small shacks, or held by residents — seek a direct relationship with the people and therefore align themselves with the local visual culture. In them, we can observe a playful and innocent mood consistent with the emotional style of the local culture, echoed also in the chromatic spectrum used, which harmonizes with the images and colors of the signs, shacks, clothing, and streets.
Note
1) The gallery was located in Paris at No. 50, rue Sainte-Croix-de-la-Bretonnerie. If we look up this address on Google Maps, we can see that today there is an optical store at number 50 on that street.
2) https://www.sangonet.com/eventc/Exposition/MaiOLLIVIER-art.html. Page visited on Jenuary 29th 2024. Author translation.
3) A reader who has not visited African cities can get an idea of the signs by visiting this web page: https://www.pinterest.it/dimsum66/hand-painted-african-signs/ (accessed on February 15, 2024).
4) Paradoxically, that is precisely the correct attitude, since classifying African artifacts as ‘works of art’ is an ethnocentric act — as if the concepts of ‘art’ and ‘artwork’ existed in the same way in those societies.
5) “‘Bangui was founded in 1890 by Michel Dolisie’ is a sentence that anyone who has completed secondary school in the Central African Republic (CAR) can recite spontaneously. In fact, history textbooks of the Central African Republic state that on May 10, 1889, Michel Dolisie, a French explorer, decided to establish the Bangui post, and on June 26, he and Uzac founded the city on the banks of the Oubangui River, on the slopes of a fairly steep hill. The goal of creating this post was to open routes toward Chad and the Nile. Two years later, an administrator arrived—Largeau—who would organize the administration. In 1903, a decree created the colony of Oubangui-Chari (which became the Central African Republic on December 1, 1958), and in 1906, another decree made Bangui the capital of this colony. The creation of Bangui ex nihilo is of interest because of its overall design as well as a certain degree of uniformity” (Bangui 2013: 107).
Bangui est fondée en 1890 par Michel Dolisie» est une phrase que récite spontanément toute personne ayant fini le collège6 en République Centrafricaine (RCA). En effet, les manuels d’histoire de la RCA indiquent que le 10 mai 1889, Michel Dolisie, un explorateur français, décide de l’installation du poste de Bangui et le 26 juin, ce dernier et Uzac créent la ville au bord du, fleuve Oubangui sur les flancs d’une colline à pentes assez fortes. L’objectif de la création de ce poste est d’ouvrir les routes du Tchad et du Nil. Deux ans plus tard, arrive un Administrateur, en la personne de Largeau qui va organiser l’administration. En 1903, un Décret crée la Colonie de l’Oubangui‑Chari (devenue République Centrafricaine, le 1er décembre 1958) et en 1906, un autre Décret fait de Bangui la capitale de cette colonie. La création ex nihilo de Bangui présente l’intérêt d’une conception d’ensemble ainsi que d’une certaine homogénéité” (Bangui 2013: 107).
6) http://www.orestezevola.com/sida_specialproject_comunicato.htm (page consulted on February 9th 2004)
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