Transart Advisor Sonia E Barrett's Dreading the Map on view at the Royal Geographical Society Map Room
CARICUK’s third provocation sets the keynote for the concept of race as in/security, and is an original art installation by Sonia Barrett, called ‘Dreading the Map’, which was installed in the Map Room of the Royal Geographical Society building during March 2021. Using carefully curated paper maps of the Caribbean and UK that have been shredded into strips, the artist and several black women co-creators used African-Caribbean hair styling techniques to plait the shredded maps. Culturally, such female spaces of hair styling are filled with discussions around self- and community-care, and this black woman-centred cultural practice juxtaposed the wood-lined walls, globes and portraits of white explorers that typify the building with the music and laughter of black women talking and working together. As a response to the RGS’s stated desire to reflect on their history and their building, this was a filling of the space with black women’s language, perspectives and practices, a reimagining of what the space can and should mean.
Find out more about CARICUK and follow the project on Twitter at @caricuk.
Film of installation and recording of discussion about the project can be found here: https://caricuk.co.uk/provocations/dreading-the-map/