Heather Agyepong: Through Motion
Heather Agyepong’s new solo exhibition Through Motion offers a mini-retrospective tracing the past three years of her multi-disciplinary creative practice. The earliest work on display will be the video performance piece The Body Remembers (2022), which will have its screening debut at Doyle Wham.
Exhibiting these two bodies of work together for the first time is an opportunity to reflect on the therapeutic role that movement plays in my work.
Reflecting on the significance of this work and the decision to exhibit it now, Agyepong says:
“When I created The Body Remembers, it was the first time I was guided by my own body rather than by archival material. Embracing physical, emotional and mental vulnerability had a transformative impact on my practice and laid the foundation for my photographic series Ego Death. Exhibiting these two bodies of work alongside each other for the first time is an opportunity to reflect and revisit, particularly on the therapeutic role that movement plays in my work. While the word ‘retrospective’ is often reserved for the end of an artist’s career, I believe that the act of looking back, as well as within, is both vital and necessary in order to move forward.”
The Body Remembers
The idea of the body as an archive is central to Agyepong’s practice and this exhibition. In The Body Remembers, the artist adopts the principles of self-directed movement therapy: moving instinctively without choreography, and in the presence of an audience, allowing the body to speak. Agyepong’s performance is soundtracked by interviews with Black British women in trauma recovery, connecting and contextualising her own process of repair.
Image © Myah Jeffers
Ego Death
In Ego Death, Agyepong delves deeper into her inner self to explore what Carl Jung termed ‘the Shadow.’ 'The Shadow’ consists of the parts of one’s personality considered unacceptable and subsequently shamed and suppressed. To reveal these parts of herself, Agyepong embraced periods of free-writing and free-painting, before enacting and embodying each emergent personality aspect through movement. This process culminated in seven self-portraits, each representing a different aspect of her Shadow.
Ego Death: Only Pino, commissioned by Jerwood Arts & Photoworks
This process culminated in seven self-portraits, each representing a different aspect of her Shadow. Agyepong drew inspiration from cultural influences in cinema, including Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight—which inspired the series’ striking blue colour palette—and characters from Jordan Peele’s Get Out.
Ego Death: Lot's Wife, commissioned by Jerwood Arts & Photoworks
This marks the first time that the artist, whose creative practice extends to a highly celebrated acting career (most recently making her West End debut as the co-lead in Shifters) has integrated elements of pop culture into her visual work. This is both a tribute to the striking impact these films have had on Agyepong’s psyche, and a testament to the increasingly holistic nature of her practice.
