Fatimah Tuggar (born 15 August 1967) is an

interdisciplinary Interdisciplinarity or interdisciplinary studies involves the combination of multiple academic disciplines into one activity (e.g., a research project). It draws knowledge from several fields such as sociology, anthropology, psychology, economi ...

artist born in

Nigeria Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean to the south. It covers an area of . With Demographics of Nigeria, ...

and based in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Tuggar uses collage and digital technology to create works that investigates dominant and linear narratives of gender, race, and technology.Jegede, Dele (2009). ''Encyclopedia of African American Artists''. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. pp. 235-237. She is currently an associate professor of AI in the Arts: Art & Global Equity at the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...

in the United States.

Early life and education

Tuggar was born in

Kaduna Kaduna is the capital city of Kaduna State, and the former political capital of Northern Nigeria. It is located in north-western Nigeria, on the Kaduna River. It is a trade center and a major transportation hub as the gateway to northern state ...

, Nigeria, in 1967.Julie L. McGee
Mechanical Hall Gallery - Fatimah Tuggar: In/Visible Seams
University of Delaware. Retrieved 5 May 2013. Tuggar studied at Blackheath School of Art in London,

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, and received a BFA from

Kansas City Art Institute The Kansas City Art Institute (KCAI) is a private art school in Kansas City, Missouri. The college was founded in 1885 and is an accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and Higher Learning Commission. The institute ...

in the United States in 1992. She completed her MFA in sculpture at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

in 1995, and conducted a one-year postgraduate independent study at the

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is a Modern art, modern and Contemporary art, contemporary American art museum located in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District and West Village neighbor ...

from 1995 to 1996. She also attended Kano Corona and Queens College Yaba in Nigeria before attending Convent of the Holy Family in Littlehampton, Sussex in England.

Career and Works

Tuggar creates images, objects, installations and web-based instructive media artworks. They juxtapose scenes from African and

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

daily life. This draws attention to the process involved and considers gendered subjectivity, belonging, and notions of progress.Fleetwood, Nicole R. ''Troubling Vision: Performance, Visuality, and Blackness''
Chapter 5 - Visible Seams: The Media Art of Fatimah Tuggar
The University of Chicago Press (2011), p. 179. . Retrieved 5 May 2013.

Materials and themes

Taking inspiration from German Dada and photomontage artists Hannah Hoch and

John Heartfield John Heartfield (born Helmut Herzfeld; 19 June 1891 – 26 April 1968) was a German visual artist who pioneered the use of art as a political weapon. Some of his most famous photomontages were anti-Nazi and anti-fascist statements. Heartfield a ...

, Tuggar's work incorporates aspects of collage to question power dynamics within dominate visual language. Sourcing photographs she shoots herself and found materials from Western commercials, magazines and archival footage, Tuggar digitally fuses images together to expose erasures in dominant representations of gender, race, geography, domestic labor, technology, and globalized capitalism while re-centering African Diasporic identities. Tuggar uses technological innovations in her work as both a medium and a method to critique Westerns concepts of linear progress. The objects usually involve some kind of

bricolage In the arts, ''bricolage'' (French language, French for "DIY" or "do-it-yourself projects"; ) is the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things that happen to be available, or a work constructed using mixed media. The t ...

; combining two or more objects from Western Africa and their Western equivalent to talk about electricity, infrastructure, access and the reciprocal influences between technology and cultures. Similarly, her computer montages and video collage works bring together both video and photographs she shoots herself and found materials from commercials, magazines and archival footage. Meaning for Tuggar seems to lie in these juxtapositions which explore how media affects our daily lives. Overall Tuggar's work uses strategies of

deconstruction In philosophy, deconstruction is a loosely-defined set of approaches to understand the relationship between text and meaning. The concept of deconstruction was introduced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who described it as a turn away from ...

to challenge our perceptions and attachments to accustomed ways of looking. Her body of work conflates ideas about race,

gender Gender is the range of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects of being a man (or boy), woman (or girl), or third gender. Although gender often corresponds to sex, a transgender person may identify with a gender other tha ...

and

class Class, Classes, or The Class may refer to: Common uses not otherwise categorized * Class (biology), a taxonomic rank * Class (knowledge representation), a collection of individuals or objects * Class (philosophy), an analytical concept used d ...

; disturbing our notions of

subjectivity The distinction between subjectivity and objectivity is a basic idea of philosophy, particularly epistemology and metaphysics. Various understandings of this distinction have evolved through the work of countless philosophers over centuries. One b ...

. Her work reflects her multifaceted identity and challenges the idea of a homogeneous Africa.

Digital photomontages

Fatimah Tuggar began making digital

photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final imag ...

s in 1995. Her early works interrogates media representations and Western perspectives of technology and labor by women in Nigeria. ''Spinner and the Spindle'' (1995) and ''Working Woman'' (1997) exemplify her early work using computer montage to digitally fuse images of Western technology with contemporary rural Nigerian women to trouble prominent and simple narratives of contemporary Africa as isolated from Western technology and progress through

digital divide The digital divide is the unequal access to information technology, digital technology, including smartphones, tablets, laptops, and the internet. The digital divide worsens inequality around access to information and resources. In the Information ...

. Tuggar use of collage and mise-en-abyme in works such as ''Working Woman'', where the image of the Nigerian woman is repeated endlessly on the computer screen Tuggar has inserted next to her, highlights the complexities of self-representation through production and reproduction in the rise of digital disseminated information. Three of Tuggar's early photomontages, ''Spinner and the Spindle'' (1995), ''Village Spells'' (1996), and ''In Touch'' (1998) were included in a 2002 special edition of ''

Social Text ''Social Text'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Duke University Press. Since its inception by an independent editorial collective in 1979, ''Social Text'' has addressed a wide range of social and cultural phenomena, covering ques ...

'' by

Alondra Nelson Alondra Nelson (born April 22, 1968) is an American academic, policy advisor, non-profit administrator, and writer. She is the Harold F. Linder chair and professor in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study, an independ ...

to discuss the recent rise of

Afrofuturism Afrofuturism is a cultural aesthetic, philosophy of science, and history that explores the intersection of the African diaspora culture with science and technology. It addresses themes and concerns of the African diaspora through technoculture ...

. ''Lady and the Maid'' (2000), ''Bedroom'' (2001), and ''Cake People'' (2001) re-imagine representations of Black women and domestic technologies by inserting African Diasporic narratives and iconography into commercialized White domestic spaces in the mid-twentieth century. Through a lens of Black Female Subjectivity, Tuggar's computer montages question power dynamics of race, gender, and technology through colonialist and consumptive frameworks. Recent photomontage works by Tuggar include ''Home's Horizons'' (2019), a diptych with an adobe home with a thatched roof and woven fence mirrored above a two-story house with a white picket fence. The second photomontage mirrors a small boat with a spacecraft, both connected by a parachute and water. Using images of thatched roofs and woven fences seen in earlier works such as ''Cake People'' and ''Working Woman'', Tuggar continues to incorporate themes of technology and domestic spaces to examine geographic and cultural liminal spaces as places of both complicity and possibility.

Video and sculptures

Incorporating similar methods of photomontage into video installations, Tuggar's ''Fusion Cuisine'' (2000) co-produced with

The Kitchen A kitchen is a room used for the preparation of food. Kitchen, or The Kitchen, may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Films * ''Kitchen'' (1966 film), an American film * ''Kitchen'' (1997 film), a Hong Kong film * ''The Kitchen'' (1961 film ...

during her Artist Production Residency, juxtaposes Cold War era American advertisements of domestic technologies targeted toward white American middle-class women and contemporary footage of African women videotaped by the artist in Nigeria. Using and critiquing technology in visual language, ''Fusion Cuisine'' shifts continuously between the archival filmstrips of postwar fantasies of modern life and

suburbia A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

and images of domestic work and play in Nigeria. ''Fusion Cuisine'' examines dominant visual language in domestic consumer technology through a transnational lens to re-evaluate colonial concepts of progress, exposing the racial and geographic erasures to imagine new visions of the future and visual narratives. Her works comment on potentially sensitive themes such as ethnicity, technology and

post-colonial Postcolonialism (also post-colonial theory) is the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic consequences of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and exploitation of colonized people and thei ...

culture. The artist chooses not to extend a didactic message, but rather to elucidate cultural nuances that go beyond obvious cross-cultural comparisons. Tuggar's sound sculptures continue to incorporate themes of

hybridity Hybridity, in its most basic sense, refers to mixture. The term originates from biology and was subsequently employed in linguistics and in racial theory in the nineteenth century. Young, Robert. ''Colonial Desire: Hybridity in Theory, Culture and ...

and technology through physical and conceptual bricolage. Her 1996 sculpture titled ''Turntable'', Tuggar uses

raffia Raffia palms are members of the genus ''Raphia''. The Malagasy language, Malagasy name is derived from ' "to squeeze #Raffia wine, juice". The genus contains about twenty species of Arecaceae, palms native to tropical regions of Africa, and esp ...

discs in place of vinyl records, referencing the ways in which the introduction of the

gramophone A phonograph, later called a gramophone, and since the 1940s a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue reproduction of sound. The sound vibration waveforms are recorded as corresponding physic ...

influenced the development of local language. Because of the physical similarly between the vinyl and fai-fai in many Northern Nigerian languages vinyl record get its name from raffia disc. For instance in

Hausa Hausa may refer to: * Hausa people, an ethnic group of West Africa * Hausa language, spoken in West Africa * Hausa Kingdoms, a historical collection of Hausa city-states * Hausa (horse) or Dongola horse, an African breed of riding horse See also ...

the raffia disc is called fai-fai and vinyl is fai-fain gramophone. ''Turntable'' was lost in 2002 and remade by Tuggar in 2010 under the title ''Fai-Fain Gramophone''. Paying homage to crafted technology used in domestic labor and music, Tuggar highlights versatile tools used by women in Nigeria by incorporating ''fai-fai'' disks, woven by women from

, in place of vinyl records. The woven disks spin in emulation of a turntable, while a hidden digital recording of Nigerian musician Barmani Chogo, plays from the sculpture. Other sound sculptures by Tuggar include ''Broom'' (1996) and ''The Talking Urinal'' (1992) both of which reference

Surrealism Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

and

Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...

's questioning of object function and representation.

Augmented reality and web-based work

In her computer montages and video collages, Tuggar brings together images that explore cultural nuances and the different relationships between people and power structures. In her web-based interactive works, participants can create their own collages by selecting animated elements and backgrounds. This process allows participants to construct or disrupt non-linear narratives. ''Changing Space'' (2002), a participatory online exhibition by Tuggar with the

Art Production Fund Art Production Fund (APF) is a non-profit organization under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, U.S. tax code that presents public art throughout the United States. It was founded in 2000 by Yvonne Force Villareal and Doreen Remen. ...

used audience interaction in a virtual space to question power dynamics of authorship and representation of modern African art in galleries and museums. Her interactive animated collage
"Transient Transfer"
allows participants to create collages from scenes in Greensboro in 2011 or the Bronx in 2008 (see
Street Art, Street Life: From 1950s to Now
" at The Bronx Museum of the Arts, New York). In her 2006 web project

created as part o
Rethinking Nordic Colonialism
Tuggar "engages the viewer/participant in a potentially loaded power space of making choices, or not choosing. Action or lack of action in this digital environment animates elements to create a dynamic collage. This collage is constructed from: ''Characters'' icons and totems, ''Context'' landscapes and commodities, and ''Behaviors'' actions and interactions between all these elements. This encourages the creation of temporary non-linear narratives, which can be constructed or disrupted based on the choices made by the participant. A key factor is the awareness of choice and the consequences of exercising or choosing not to exercise this potential power." Continuing concepts of technology, labor, hybridity, and globalized capitalism, Tuggar's recent use of

Augmented Reality Augmented reality (AR), also known as mixed reality (MR), is a technology that overlays real-time 3D computer graphics, 3D-rendered computer graphics onto a portion of the real world through a display, such as a handheld device or head-mounted ...

and

Virtual Reality Virtual reality (VR) is a Simulation, simulated experience that employs 3D near-eye displays and pose tracking to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video gam ...

in participatory works include ''Desired Dwellings'' (2009) and the commissioned work by The Davis Museum ''Deep Blue Wells'' (2019). ''Deep Blue Wells'' explores the history and contemporary collaborative process and labor of

indigo InterGlobe Aviation Limited (d/b/a IndiGo), is an India, Indian airline headquartered in Gurgaon, Haryana, India. It is the largest List of airlines of India, airline in India by passengers carried and fleet size, with a 64.1% domestic market ...

dye wells and fabric dyeing in

Kano Kano may refer to: Places *Kano State, a state in Northern Nigeria *Kano (city), a city in Nigeria, and the capital of Kano State ** Kingdom of Kano, a Hausa kingdom between the 10th and 14th centuries ** Sultanate of Kano, a Hausa kingdom betwee ...

, and contends with the effects of globalized capitalism.

Exhibitions

Tuggar has shown her work in group exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, and at international biennial exhibitions such as the

Moscow Biennale The Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art is one of the most important Russian cultural events and was founded in 2003. First Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art The First Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art (January 28 – February 28, 2005) ca ...

of Contemporary Art 2005,

Palais des Beaux-Arts The Centre for Fine Arts (, ; , ) is a multi-purpose cultural venue in the Royal Quarter of Brussels, Belgium. It is often referred to as BOZAR (a homophone of ''Beaux-arts'') in French or by its initials PSK in Dutch. This multidisciplinary ...

, Brussels 2003,

Centre Georges Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the (), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English and colloquially as Beaubourg, is a building complex in Paris, France. It was designed in the style of high-tech architecture by the architectural team of ...

in Paris 2005, and the

Bamako Bamako is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Mali, with a 2022 population of 4,227,569. It is located on the Niger River, near the rapids that divide the upper and middle Niger valleys in the southwestern part of the country. Bamak ...

Biennal, Mali, 2003. Tuggar's work will be included in the 2023

Sharjah Biennial The Sharjah Biennial is a large-scale contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in the city of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. The first Sharjah Biennial took place in 1993, and was organized by the Sharjah Department of Cu ...

in United Arab Emirates. Additional exhibitions include: *2019 ''Fatimah Tuggar: Home's Horizons,'' The Davis Museum at

Wellesley College Wellesley College is a Private university, private Women's colleges in the United States, historically women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Wellesley, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1870 by Henr ...

*2019 ''Charlotte Street Awards Exhibition'',

Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art opened in 1994 in Kansas City, Missouri. With a $5 million annual budget and approximately 75,000 visitors each year, it is Missouri's first and largest contemporary museum. Founders The core of the museum's per ...

, Kansas City, Missouri *2019 ''Knowledge'', The

Spencer Museum of Art The Spencer Museum of Art is an art museum operated by the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, United States. History In 1917, the Kansas City art collector Sallie Casey Thayer donated her collection of over seven thousand works of art, ...

, The University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas *2017, 2018 ''Flow of Forms/Forms of Flow'',

Museum am Rothenbaum The Museum am Rothenbaum – Kulturen und Künste der Welt (lit. ''Museum at the Rotherbaum, Rothenbaum – Cultures and Arts of the World'', abbr.: MARKK, former name: Museum of Ethnology, Hamburg, ), founded in 1879, is today one of the largest ...

, Hamburg, Germany and Kunstraum, Munchen, Germany *2015 ''Appropriation Art: Finding Meaning in Found-Image Collage'' The Bascom: A Center for the Visual Arts, Highlands, North Carolina *2013 ''In/Visible Seams'' Mechanical Hall Gallery, University of Delaware, Newark, DE *2012 ''Fatimah Tuggar'', Institute for Women and Art, Mary Hana Women Artists Series Galleries, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey *2012, 2011, 2010 ''The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl'',

Nasher Museum of Art The Nasher Museum of Art (previously the Duke University Museum of Art) is the art museum of Duke University, and is located on Duke's campus in Durham, North Carolina, United States. History In 1936, art collector William Hayes Ackland wro ...

, Duke University and The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston *2012 ''Harlem Postcards'', Studio Museum Harlem, New York, NY *2011 ''Dream Team, Works from 1995-2011'', GreenHill Center for North Carolina Art, Greensboro, North Carolina *2010 ''One Blithe Day'', Link Media Wall, Perkins Library, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina *2009 ''Tell Me Again: A Concise Retrospective'', Franklin Humanities Institute, Duke University, Durham, NC *2009 ''Desired Dwellings: Project for an Immersive Virtual Environment'', Duke Immersive Virtual Environment, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina *2009 ''On Screen: Global Intimacy'' Artspace at Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO *2005 ''Inna's Recipe'', Indiana Black Expo's Summer Celebration, Cultural Arts Pavilion, Indianapolis, Indiana *2005 ''Rencontres de Bamako: Biennale Africaine de la Photographie: Telling Time'' *2002 ''Changing Space'',

, New York, New York *2002 ''Tempo'', Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York *2002 ''Africaine:

Candice Breitz Candice Breitz (born 1972) is a South African artist who works primarily in video and photography.

Wangechi Mutu Wangechi Mutu (born 1972) is a Kenyan American visual artist, known primarily for her painting, sculpture, film, and performance work.

, Tracey Rose, and Fatimah Tuggar'', The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, New York *2001 ''Empire/State: Artists Engaging Globalization'' The Art Gallery of the Graduate Center, The City University of New York *2000 ''Poetics and Power''

Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland The Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (abbreviated to moCa) is a contemporary art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is the only contemporary art venue of its kind in Metropolitan Cleveland. The organisation was founded by Marjorie ...

*2000 ''Crossing the Line''

Queens Museum of Art The Queens Museum (formerly the Queens Museum of Art) is an art museum and educational center at Flushing Meadows–Corona Park in Queens, New York City, United States. Established in 1972, the museum includes the '' Panorama of the City of Ne ...

*2000 ''The New World, The Vices and Virtues, Bienal de Valencia, Spain Bienal de Maia, Porto, Portugal *2000 ''Celebrations'' Galeria Joao Graça, Lisbon, Portugal *2000 ''At the Water Tap'' Greene Naftali Gallery, New York *2000 ''Tell Me Again'', The Kitchen, New York, New York *2000 ''Fusion Cuisine'', The Kitchen, New York, New York, Le Musee Chateau, Annecy, France *2000 ''Fatimah Tuggar'', Art and Public, Geneva, Switzerland *1999 ''The Passion and the Wave'' 6th International

Istanbul Biennial The Istanbul Biennial is a contemporary art exhibition that has been held biennially in Istanbul, Turkey, since 1987. The Biennial has been organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (IKSV) since its inception. Istanbul Biennial p ...

*1999 ''Beyond Technology: Working in Brooklyn''

Brooklyn Museum of Art The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough (New York City), borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Located near the Prospect Heig ...

, New York *1998 ''Village Spells'' Plexus.org *1992 ''Revolving Room'', The Founders Gallery, Kansas City, Missouri *1992 ''Between Space and Light'', Leedy-Volkus Art Center, Kansas City, Missouri

References

External links

Fatimah Tuggar Interview

Series Money & Matter
2002