“Meta Masoxi” was commissioned by Le Cube Garges as part of their “Cerveau Machine” Exhibition (Paris, March 2023) and since it has also been exhibited at Lab ISEA - Palais Augmenté and MEET Milano. This piece is a phygital experience that includes a 3D printed wood mask and an augmented-reality Snapchat Lens.
Meta Masóxi (tears in kimbundu) is a phygital entity whose spirit (hamba) is resting on a 3d printed mask (mukishi) that can be digitally summoned through an augmented-reality ritual. This piece is a re-artefact of the traditional Choke “Pwo” mask, a process of postdigital craftsmanship in which the author revisits ancestral symbols through the contemporary gaze.
A human-machine collaboration between an African woman, intergenerational connection, traumas and beauty, online research, 3d softwares and a head scan. Meta Masóxi (tears) re-visits this artefact by re-crafting the gender hierarchy in the tools of authorship and performance of this traditional mask, and thus its temporary meaning.
As a re-artefact, this is a phygital object for the past… of the future, participating on “eternal” symbols through ephemeral tools. Translating the process of wood carving into 3d craftsmanship, and replacing the portraiture of a muse, with a human-machine enabled process of Meta Selfie.obj, imagining a future when virtual archaeologists will harvest hard drives for rare data.
Meta Masóxi is a re-artefact, a process of post digital craftsmanship in which the author revisits ancestral symbols through the contemporary gaze.
Re-artefact is the action of re-feeling the void left by the African artefacts that were stolen during colonisation.
Re-claiming the gaze upon these artefacts through the 3rd world and 3d cultured perspective, of the African diasporean expression.
Re-artefact is an action of intersectional-hybritisation: making sense of self-as-technology and agent of future ancient history, through the multi-reality-platform of expression, by expanding the dialogue between one’s Identity vs Culture, in order to accommodate the ever-changing vocabulary of self.
It is an umbilical cord braided by meat and wi-fi connections, carved on a www.placenta of hybrid memory and emotional networks.