Revealing the crisis of testimony that arises when the past is not contained

Libita Sibungu (1987 - )

stone lithograph print

2018
  • About the work
    Location
    Country: UK
    City: London
    Place: Government Art Collection
    This lithographic print provokes the question of what the space of imagination is. It is based on Libita Sibungu’s notes on Jean Fischer’s ‘contextualisation of post-colonial trauma survived into a poetics of remembrance’ evoked in Kobena Mercer’s Exiles, Diasporas and Strangers (2008) – a cross-cultural overview of the experiences of migration and displacement that characterise so much of twentieth-century art.
    Revealing the crisis of testimony that arises when the past is not contained was produced during the artist’s 2018 residence in Johannesburg, during which she was trained in the process of lithographic printing, and was subsequently shown in the group exhibition Get Up, Stand Up Now at Somerset House, London (2019).
  • About the artist
    British-Namibian artist Libita Sibungu studied Print & Digital Media at Wimbledon College of Art, University of the Arts London (2006-09). She has exhibited and presented performances since 2016, with the solo exhibitions: ‘Quantum Ghost’, Gasworks, London and Spike Island, Bristol (2019); and ‘I’m not my...my injuries are healed now but I still don’t remember things’, Cabaret Voltaire, Switzerland (2019). Her work was included in the Diaspora Pavilion, 57th Venice Biennale (2017). Selected awards include: Developing Your Creative Practice, Arts Council England Fund, (2019-2020); Freelands Foundation Programme in association with Gasworks (2018-19); and Triangle Network Fellowship, Bagfactory, Johannesburg (2018).
  • Explore
    Places
    Subjects
    text-based work
    Materials & Techniques
    lithograph
  • Details
    Title
    Revealing the crisis of testimony that arises when the past is not contained
    Edition
    One of edition of 6, plus 1 artist's proof
    Date
    2018
    Medium
    stone lithograph print
    Acquisition
    Purchased from the artist March 2021, through the Art XUK project 2020-21
    Provenance
    The artist; from whom purchased by UK Government Art Collection, 31 March 2021
    GAC number
    18966