Kamau Nganga

People Watching is an installation consisting of three rooms, a living room, dining room, and kitchen, and six figures made of scrap-wood as well as an archival video work. It is a part of a larger research into the theatre involved in the performance of a self. The self as a performance can be understood to be all the aspects of the self that are presented externally. The six scrap-wood figures exist in within their own constructed domestic space consisting of a living room, dining room and kitchen. The figures, in a similar fashion to puppets, essentially function as human surrogates, having the form and potential to be recognised and understood as human and existing in a human space but without any sort of will or desires. The puppet is an inanimate object. It only exists as an entity who can be interrogated while performing and is transformed back into an inanimate object when the performance ends. Within their theatrical space, their lifeless bodies are manoeuvred from room to room placed in relation with one another to give the idea that they are not lifeless puppets but living performers with relationships, personalities, and wants. On the television placed in the living room, a compilation of clips of government-made and owned footage from the United States National Archives featuring clips in which one or more subjects, behaving presumably as they usually do, realise that they are being filmed, and subsequently recompose themselves with the knowledge that they are being watched. In this moment, the subject becomes fully cognizant of their performance and must pretend to be who they are like actors on a stage. The film was made as a part of my research into the self. Specifically, in this case, into the self as a performance and that, as a performance, only comes into being as it is observed. The things one holds to be true about oneself can only be made manifest in the world external to the self through the performance of specific culturally recognisable signifiers that indicate specific identities, dispositions and desires. In putting it together, I scrubbed through hundreds of videos looking for that singular, delicate moment where a transformation takes place between a self that is unaware of its being surveilled and one that does. Photo taken by Eric de Vries

People Watching is an installation consisting of three rooms, a living room, dining room, and kitchen, and six figures made of scrap-wood as well as an archival video work. It is a part of a larger research into the theatre involved in the performance of a self. The self as a performance can be understood to be all the aspects of the self that are presented externally. The six scrap-wood figures exist in within their own constructed domestic space consisting of a living room, dining room and kitchen. The figures, in a similar fashion to puppets, essentially function as human surrogates, having the form and potential to be recognised and understood as human and existing in a human space but without any sort of will or desires. The puppet is an inanimate object. It only exists as an entity who can be interrogated while performing and is transformed back into an inanimate object when the performance ends. Within their theatrical space, their lifeless bodies are manoeuvred from room to room placed in relation with one another to give the idea that they are not lifeless puppets but living performers with relationships, personalities, and wants. On the television placed in the living room, a compilation of clips of government-made and owned footage from the United States National Archives featuring clips in which one or more subjects, behaving presumably as they usually do, realise that they are being filmed, and subsequently recompose themselves with the knowledge that they are being watched. In this moment, the subject becomes fully cognizant of their performance and must pretend to be who they are like actors on a stage. The film was made as a part of my research into the self. Specifically, in this case, into the self as a performance and that, as a performance, only comes into being as it is observed. The things one holds to be true about oneself can only be made manifest in the world external to the self through the performance of specific culturally recognisable signifiers that indicate specific identities, dispositions and desires. In putting it together, I scrubbed through hundreds of videos looking for that singular, delicate moment where a transformation takes place between a self that is unaware of its being surveilled and one that does. Photo taken by Eric de Vries

Shot of the puppets in the living room watching television together.

Close up of the television with two puppets in the kitchen in the background.

Shot of the puppets at the dinner table.

Getting Comfortable in your Skin-suit is an installation featuring four scrap-wood sculptures and a film comprised mostly of archival footage from United States government-made/distributed video as a part of an ongoing exploration of truth and its performativity. In the installation, the figures are positioned and posed to mimic a family in a living room watching television. The scene is inspired by lifestyle illustrations from America in the 1960’s and 1970’s. These illustrations are of particular interest to this installation because what is displayed in them is a specific cultural ideal for what a family look like and how they behave, which is echoed in the film. The figures, though, in contrast to their ordinary and recognisable situation, are monstrous in size and form, being about two meters tall in seated positions and being covered in the sharp edges of the splintered wood and rusted nails of which they are composed. The figures each wear large masks made from domestic objects like the window frame or cupboard door over flat, nondescript faces. Within the scene I have crafted, I understand the figures as performers acting out a domestic scene existing purely through this performance to convince an audience of the actuality of their truth. It is in this contrast between presentation and performance that the work is primarily interested. Projected on the wall is an archival film of just under half an hour. The film uses archival footage and audio from the US National Archives to discuss the way a self is constructed and all that which goes into crafting a self and the appropriate way to do that. The use of re-edited archival material, and specifically US government material, provides a secondary voice. A secondary voice which has had a clear and historical agenda in pushing for and prescribing the way a self should present and perform. Photo: Ira Gruen

Getting Comfortable in your Skin-suit is an installation featuring four scrap-wood sculptures and a film comprised mostly of archival footage from United States government-made/distributed video as a part of an ongoing exploration of truth and its performativity. In the installation, the figures are positioned and posed to mimic a family in a living room watching television. The scene is inspired by lifestyle illustrations from America in the 1960’s and 1970’s. These illustrations are of particular interest to this installation because what is displayed in them is a specific cultural ideal for what a family look like and how they behave, which is echoed in the film. The figures, though, in contrast to their ordinary and recognisable situation, are monstrous in size and form, being about two meters tall in seated positions and being covered in the sharp edges of the splintered wood and rusted nails of which they are composed. The figures each wear large masks made from domestic objects like the window frame or cupboard door over flat, nondescript faces. Within the scene I have crafted, I understand the figures as performers acting out a domestic scene existing purely through this performance to convince an audience of the actuality of their truth. It is in this contrast between presentation and performance that the work is primarily interested. Projected on the wall is an archival film of just under half an hour. The film uses archival footage and audio from the US National Archives to discuss the way a self is constructed and all that which goes into crafting a self and the appropriate way to do that. The use of re-edited archival material, and specifically US government material, provides a secondary voice. A secondary voice which has had a clear and historical agenda in pushing for and prescribing the way a self should present and perform. Photo taken by Dustin James

Assembling the sculptures for documentation. Photo taken by Dustin James

Close-up of the mask-covered head of one of the figure. Photo taken by Dustin James

Premonition is a of 12 plaster casts of a digitally sculpted and then printed self-portrait. Each of the heads is approximately the size of my own and each has been disfigured through a repetitive process of either driving a steel rod through them with a hammer or repeatedly striking them with a crowbar in patterns that mimic real facial injuries sourced from medical journals. Through this series I explored a more metaphorical obsession with the conceptual destruction of the self as a true and believed entity through the physical destruction of my likeness through an intensely physical, labour intensive process. Adding to this, in creating the likeness, it was important to me to sculpt rather than scan my head before printing it, producing a cast of a print of a “hand” rendered digital object. Like with the self, both the crafting and destruction of these objects needed to feel labour intensive and time-consuming.

Premonition is a of 12 plaster casts of a digitally sculpted and then printed self-portrait. Each of the heads is approximately the size of my own and each has been disfigured through a repetitive process of either driving a steel rod through them with a hammer or repeatedly striking them with a crowbar in patterns that mimic real facial injuries sourced from medical journals. Through this series I explored a more metaphorical obsession with the conceptual destruction of the self as a true and believed entity through the physical destruction of my likeness through an intensely-physical, labour intensive process. Adding to this, in creating the likeness, it was important to me to sculpt rather than scan my head before printing it, producing a cast of a print of a “hand” rendered digital object. Like with the self, both the crafting and destruction of these objects needed to feel labour intensive and time-consuming.

Premonition is a of 12 plaster casts of a digitally sculpted and then printed self-portrait. Each of the heads is approximately the size of my own and each has been disfigured through a repetitive process of either driving a steel rod through them with a hammer or repeatedly striking them with a crowbar in patterns that mimic real facial injuries sourced from medical journals. Through this series I explored a more metaphorical obsession with the conceptual destruction of the self as a true and believed entity through the physical destruction of my likeness through an intensely-physical, labour intensive process. Adding to this, in creating the likeness, it was important to me to sculpt rather than scan my head before printing it, producing a cast of a print of a “hand” rendered digital object. Like with the self, both the crafting and destruction of these objects needed to feel labour intensive and time-consuming.