A reversed retrogress, scene 1. 2013
Fibreglass mannequins and cotton textile with suspended installation of creatures (polyester fibrefill stuffing and cotton fabric)

Mary Sibande engages counterhistorical narratives and the language of dress to animate the stories of South African women and critique western imperialist depictions of their lives. A Reverse Retrogress: Scene 1 (2013) features her alter ego, Sophie, whose many incarnations speak to Sibande’s mother’s and grandmother’s experiences under apartheid. In this work, Sophie takes on the cultural role of a maid while facing a purple figure surrounded by a cloud of embryonic beings, the colour signifying the 1989 Purple Rain anti-apartheid protest in Cape Town. The assemblage reveals the tension between a colonial past and postcolonial present.
(Text at the exhibition. © Sharjah Art Foundation)