GODFRIED DONKOR (B. 1964)
GODFRIED DONKOR (B. 1964)
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Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's… Read more
GODFRIED DONKOR (B. 1964)

Jamestown Masquerade XII

Details
GODFRIED DONKOR (B. 1964)
Jamestown Masquerade XII
signed, titled, numbered and dated '3/5 Jamestown Masquerade XII 2011 Godfried donkor' (on the reverse)
C-print
image: 15 7/8 x 23 3/4in. (40.2 x 60.2cm.)
sheet: 19 5/8 x 27 1/2in. (49.8 x 69.8cm.)

Photographed in 2006 and printed in 2011, this work is number three from an edition of five
Provenance
Fred Gallery, London.
Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2012.
Exhibited
Accra, Gallery 1957, Godfried Donkor, 2017 (another version exhibited).
Special notice
Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent.

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Lot Essay

Godfried Donkor is a multidisciplinary British-Ghanainan artist whose work examines the charged socio-historical relationship between Africa, Europe and the Caribbean. Donkor mines imagery from religious, archival and pop-cultural sources to suggest and map alternative histories. These sources often exist at opposing ends of hierarchies of power. The fantasy worlds presented by Donkor depict an accelerated utopian creolisation which in turn highlights the persistence of dominant hierarchies built upon racial divisions.
Donkor’s photographic series Jamestown Masquerade was created as a response to 19th century English explorer Thomas Bowdich’s illustrated account of his diplomatic mission to the Asante Kingdom in Ghana in 1817 to secure peace with its ruler, Osei Bonsu. Whilst Bowdich’s narrative is noted as painting an observant and positive picture of the Asante kingdom at the height of its power and splendour, he remained an instrument of the state apparatus of control. His mission—to ostensibly secure peace with the Asante empire—was part of a wider plan to annex the entire Gold Coast under the influence of the British Empire.
In Donkor’s photographs, masks obscure the face of the wearer in the same way as the true motivations of Bowdich and Bonsu were obscured. The notion of the masquerade differs across cultures: in West Africa it continues to occupy as prominent a role as it did in Venice in the 19th century. Created in collaboration with the designer Allan Davids, Donkor’s series engages in a playful, theatrical creolisation: the masks and costumes the models wear are inspired by Venetian masked balls, but fabricated out of traditional Ghanaian Kente cloth.
In Jamestown Masquerade VI we see a man and a woman sitting in front of a dilapidated bay window and balustrade. Although the figures sit closely there is a Machiavellian energy to their interaction, suggesting the interplay of power relations taking precedent over any kind of honest or authentic association.
Jamestown Masquerade XII shows five women at a distance gazing imperiously through their extravagant masks, seemingly interrogating the viewer’s rank and status. In the background the commercial fishing boats evoke Venetian gondolas.
Donkor represented Ghana at the 2001 Venice Biennale. His work is in the collection of the National Museum of African Art at the Smithsonian Institution, and has been shown at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; the Belvedere, Vienna; and the Studio Museum, New York. He was recently the subject of a solo exhibition at Gallery 1957, London, in 2021.

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