Risposte particolari. Prospettive di genere sull’arte contemporanea kanak

Abstract

This article is the result of an experience in the field, during March and April 2008. The destination of my trip was the Pacific island of New Caledonia, situated about two thousand kilometres from the east coast of Australia. The research was mainly carried out in Noumea, the capital city of New Caledonia, and in the Cultural Centre Tjibaou. This is the biggest contemporary art promoter in New Caledonia and one of the biggest and most influential in all the Pacific area.
The main subject of the work was the study of contemporary art produced by Kanak women. This is a very recent phenomenon, showing greater awareness since its inception in the last two decades of the twentieth century. I was interested in understanding the fundamental cultural and social dynamics that allow its development.
I chose a perspective that underlines women’s artistic production and their capacity to be an active subject in their story through the analysis of their creative representation. I understood talking to Maryline Thydjiepache, Yvette Bouquet and Paula Boy - the artists I interviewed – that in their creative choices there is a strong identitary claim accomplished by a foreign medium: the contemporary art.
The contemporary artistic production of the Kanak women is affected both by traditional cultural elements and the particular influence of the western idea of art. In order to analyse this phenomenon I used Clifford’s articulation between routes and roots. It is a way to show how native people’s identity, even if deep-seated in the traditional cultural heritage, is also embedded in the state of being contemporary, thus, utilising modern and foreign media to define themselves. These phenomenons, like contemporary art, have been domesticated: in this way, once they have lost their otherness nature, they can be inserted in the local contest and be utilised to define the Kanak identity.

Keywords: gender, contemporary art, Kanak, New Caledonia.
Parole chiave: genere, arte contemporanea, Kanak, Nuova Caledonia.