Visual artist and writer.

Our first lecture back was presented by young visual artist and writer, Madinah Farhannah Thompson, vocalising her personal experience and what drives her practice, she talked us through reoccurring themes of being a black woman living in a predominantly white area. Explaining her process and her drive to create was something that I resonated to – having gained an interest in filmography and collage making. Madinah Farhannah Thompson focuses her practice around the fetishisation of black women’s bodies and explained that living in a predominantly white area means that she feels disconnected from others. She went on to say that this was emphasised during the BLM movement – seeing how people were triggered during this movement and protested that All lives matter was playing a big part in the artist feeling isolated and afraid of being racially attacked.

The artist uses videography to communicate her work and voices her struggles. She showed us a few films but one really stood out to me. She would show her body to stand up to the emotional abuse she faced and voiced how hard it was to heal from this in a community where she felt so isolated. Near the end of the video she stares directly into the camera, into our eyes. She explained that looking into the camera was an act to rebel against the white gaze. This powerful effect made me realise that there is so much I could explore with when making my own films, breaking the 4th wall and communicating something words can’t. As the artist put it, when it’s visual, there is a universality to it and more people are able to connect to it.

I made a poster to explore some of the themes the artist spoke about that made her work truly unique. The way her struggles were so vulnerably shared with her audience and made up her art was something truly inspiring to watch. Having listened to her techniques and seen how effective they can be, I am really wanting to try some of these when making my own films.

Above is an example of one of the collages by the artist. There are so many powerful themes within this collage and looking at it is beautiful – the mix between imagery and text gives context to the piece and creates a beautiful harmony and flow to the work.