Unleashed! Feminine Rage

I was very flattered to be invited to send some work the The Viewing Room Art Gallery, in Pretoria for an exhibit running 3-27 August 2024, called UNLEASHED! FEMININE RAGE. 4 of my favourite works are on show:

ARTIST STATEMENT: FEMININE RAGE

My artistic journey is an imperative pursuit to give voice to the truths I seek in myself, as well as to provoke self-examination and insight in others. It allows the release of a deep paradoxical joy that comes from turning pain into beauty.

Untapped feminine rage burns, undimmed, at the centre of my being—a flame ignited when I took my name back. It is a theme that surfaces often in my work, at times quietly and subtly insinuated; at others screamed to the world with a voice silenced for decades.

I was born and raised in a strictly patriarchal time, where women had roles, rules, and places but no voice. I railed against it from the moment I understood what it meant: I was inferior, a minority, less than, and expected to believe and obey without question.

Mine was not a peaceful youth. My loathing of this pervasive societal construct was everywhere, and I began to contextualize it through literature and the themes I adopted during my high school art studies. In my forties, I resumed my creative passions and found, for the first time, that I could express in pictures what I could not say in words. The rage became manifest. I had been reading from a script learned by rote in childhood: women are raped because they wear short skirts. Dressing ‘like a whore’ would get me what I deserved. Making a fuss was not appropriate. Being touched without consent was acceptable behaviour — boys will be boys — and no meant yes.

Slut-shaming was not a word that existed when it happened to me, the first time I was raped. Nor the second. I absorbed the grief and anger of violation and turned it on myself. Art has given me a voice to express years of unfelt feelings, unacknowledged injustice, and uncried tears of grief, for a child who knew too young.

Now that my voice has been found, it will never be silenced.

Gender and social injustice are pivotal subjects in much of my work. Jarring or unsettling juxtapositions and impossible encounters that push the boundaries of my understanding. My artwork is often created in a hyper-focused, trancelike state, and while its significance is sometimes immediately glaring, it sometimes only becomes apparent after deep reflection. I strive for authenticity, trying to never contrive meaning or force interpretation on viewers.

The works selected for this exhibition all speak to the cost of being feminine under toxic patriarchy: being controlled, violated, devalued, and underestimated. To the insidious colonisation of our minds. To the voice that screams back. It can take a lifetime to truly accept that we are not to blame and to stop turning the rage on ourselves. Or at least try. For me, art is a crucial step in healing, finding a voice and helping others to do the same.

They are not subtle works. They seek to provoke or resolve triggers in me and others who said #metoo. A call to allow pain to be expressed, to mean something. They are holding out a hand.

NIKI MCQUEEN

 2024

These works are dedicated to those who have yet to find a voice.

Curatorial Statement: