Me, the dark, a painting exhibition by Emmanuel Mettles at Kerala Lalithakala Akademi art gallery.
| Photo Credit: K. K. NAJEEB
“Being dark skinned is resentful. Being a dark-skinned woman, makes it bitter,” says Emmanuel Mettles, a psychologist-artist.
Me, the Dark, a painting exhibition that speaks about the politics of black, was held at Kerala Lalithakala Akademi here.
“As a dark-complexioned woman, I have been subjected to body shaming many times. Once after facing a humiliating experience, back home, I painted some rough and bold black strokes on the canvas and titled it ‘Me , the dark.”
A psychologist by profession, Ms. Mettles says that she frequently encounters children facing similar humiliation. They are broken from inside with shattered self-esteem. How we can expect these broken individuals to develop into strong and efficient persons. “The gaze of the society often ruins their confidence.”
Her paintings are the overflow of her emotions. Her art springs from and strings around the concept “Me, the Dark”. She could pour everything that was haunting her to the canvas.
One of her paintings shows an absurd figure of a dark woman with no eyes and head. “She is seen, but can’t see. She is thought about, but can’t think”. In another, a woman is trying to look at the world but with closed eyes. Amidst the dark painting, there is a patch of colour, a flower. “It shows the wish in her, which no social taboos not even she herself could restrict.”
Ms. Mettles observes, “Our society’s obsession with fair skin may be a remnant of the feudal era.” She adds, “Having spent most of my life outside Kerala, I always admired its high literacy and cultural heritage, but things are not as I imagined upon arriving here.”
Among the works, contrasting from the dusky canvases, there is a light green-shaded painting of a dragonfly. “I saw a dragonfly on the way home. It was tired, injured and almost dead. I stopped and watched. It tried to fly but failed. It couldn’t flap its wings as they were wet. A garden lizard was on look. I patted dry its wings and it flew away.” “The look of the lizard implies “male gaze”.
The painting exhibition, which was curated by Ranju leaf, concluded on Saturday.
