Black History Month profile:
Bokani Tshidzu (continued)

In the second part of this interview, Bokani shares the deep joys and challenges of her work.

You can read part 1 of our conversation with Bokani here.

Part 2

Shanon: I like that you brought up your art at this point. Because I first knew you through that meeting we had between Faith for the Climate and Operation Noah a few years ago, on Zoom. And then Giles and I came to your exhibition, in person. And this happened at a time when I was thinking, how do we communicate the climate crisis and all its complexity? That it’s not just about climate, it’s about so many other things? This was some months after the killing of George Floyd in the US and Belly Mujinga in the UK. But I found, for me personally, there’s a lot of art that attempts to talk about climate and nature that sometimes can feel narrow and didactic. Or if the art is not narrow or didactic, I might be able to appreciate it but I don’t know if I can see myself in it as a person of faith.

But then I went to your exhibition, and it spoke to all these different sides of me. It spoke to the activist in me, the artist in me, and most importantly, I felt a spirituality in it, I want to say it was almost mystical in a way. I love your work.

All this is a long prelude to say that you can bring anything at all that you want to my next question, which is, what aspects of your work make you joyful?

Bokani: It’s a really interesting question to ask now because that exhibition was in 2021. You know, when we think about climate justice and racial justice, the title of the show was ‘Reconciliation: The Unfinished Business of Liberation‘. So I was thinking a lot and I continue to think a lot about what it means to be liberated, to be free. The idea of reconciliation in the Catholic tradition is confession, and so there’s a conversational aspect to that and a relationship aspect to it that I thought was important to consider. And I wanted the word ‘business’ in there because I felt like a lot of the time companies are sort of the mysterious invisible hand that operates a lot of our lives and have such deep influences in where we find joy and freedom. It was quite an important show in helping me explore all those things, which is why I’m so glad that your experience of it is what I would have hoped for.

When I’m painting, I don’t really go into the studio with an image in mind of what I’m going to make. That show was unique in that a lot of the works were more premeditated than usual for me. But when I’m just making abstract paintings, whether it’s on the mirrored glass surfaces, or on paper, I like to lay the paint down and then sort of dance with it. So, it becomes a bit like a trance in a way. I stop being Bokani as this person in this body in this time and become part of a dance, a cosmic dance. And that’s when I know that I’m really in a painting, like when it’s really happening. And in those moments I feel freest and most joyful. It’s a very pure joy in that I don’t feel like it takes away from anyone else. It’s an experience that is not harming to anybody else. And there’s a sense in which I feel free in that because there’s no expectation, and yet what I’m given is so much more abundant than what I could have hoped for.

I hope my art moves people. And I think we do more out of joyful giving than we do out of guilty attempts at correcting things. I think we’re capable of so much and when we’re giving and loving. For me, ‘love’ is a doing word.

The joy that I get when coming back to the studio and finding a painting there that is sort of the residue of that ecstatic moment is a surprise and delight. That’s like the second layer of joy.

And then there’s a third layer of when others experience it. My most recent art exhibition was one in which I gifted the last 10 years of work to my wider community, my London community, but also people who were walking off the street and were just like, what, I can take a picture of this? And some of the people who knew how much these paintings have sold for in the past, you know, they’re like, this is worth thousands of pounds and I can just take it? I really wanted people to experience a sense of that abundance. The idea that being an artist isn’t something that I’ve earned somehow. Art comes through me and so I’m just making myself available to it. That third layer of joy comes from experiencing others experience it and, as far as I can, removing barriers to their enjoyment. I hope my art moves people. And I think we do more out of joyful giving than we do out of guilty attempts at correcting things. I think we’re capable of so much and when we’re giving and loving. For me, ‘love’ is a doing word.

I’m most joyful when I feel free. When I’m in community, spiritually and relationally. And I think experiencing beauty is an important part of this. There are sometimes ways that I know that a painting works – it connects me to an ancient part of me. So sometimes when people try and say, ‘you’re a Black artist’, or ‘you’re a woman artist’, it’s such a narrow view. It’s like such a small part of who I really.

Shanon: It’s like that film Babette’s Feast. Bokani’s Feast!

Bokani: It’s interesting because people did ask me, you know, have you come into money? Or have you had some sort of horrible diagnosis? I was like, please God, no. But imagine if we have to wait for that kind of thing for us to live fully, to decide to listen to this call to grace. That invitation that my faith calls me to – my friendships, the love that I’ve received – I am called to give out a feast because I’ve been feasting.

My experience of nature is one of, like, ‘Look at what we’ve been given. Don’t you want to give as a result of that?’ Look at my friendships. I’m so thankful. I’ve got gorgeous friendships in my family – I was adopted. I have been feasting, so to hoard, to me, seems antithetical to everything I’ve experienced.

Shanon: And as we’re talking about joy, I will always remember this moment when you and I bumped into each other at this conference. I think we were just talking like we are now about art, activism, climate justice, ending fossil fuels, and we were laughing, and suddenly this complete stranger walks past us and says, ‘Both of you are the most joyful people in this conference. How do I tap into this?’ And I was like, we don’t even know you. But you said, quick as a flash, ‘Well, come join our radical decolonial intersectional faith-based climate justice movement.’ I was like, okay, werq!

Bokani: I do remember this. But you know, for the longest time I hadn’t had those words for what we’re part of, you know? I don’t know that being in the climate space has to be all mourning and sackcloth. I’m not that personality. It’s not in me.

You know, being an artist, I accidentally started working on reflective surfaces. But this accident has taught me that I get to reflect back the energy that I’m receiving and so the great joy of meeting you was that light – we’re meeting more light, you know? And it’s in an honest way. It’s not to diminish the suffering that we see in the world, but it’s to say that something more powerful than that exists.

Convenience is cheap because we’re not taking into account at whose expense we’re living.

Shanon: And for me, the thing that speaks to my approach to joy and spirit is the quote by [the 13th century Muslim scholar and mystic Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad] Rumi, which is something like don’t ignore your wound, but be gentle with it. Because that’s how the light will enter you. What aspects do you find most challenging?

Bokani: The first thing that comes to mind is the ways in which systems of power are very subtle. So the harms that are done, especially by companies, are so well hidden. Or we don’t acknowledge or recognise or hold to account the ways in which extractive industries facilitate convenience for us. And so we’re making these trade-offs of preferring convenience. Convenience is cheap because we’re not taking into account at whose expense we’re living.

So, for example, I talk a lot about Deliveroo and the way in which as a cyclist in London, I think the most dangerous people are people on scooters who are delivering food, because the incentive system for them is the more you deliver, the more money you can make. And they’re barely making enough to live on. Convenience is you get a meal to your door. Is it affordable? For some. But it’s at the expense of someone who has had to leave their home country, typically, to come and run between a restaurant and your house to give you food.

So, think about all the layers of that interaction. You’re pressing on a button on your phone. Literally, the layers – where has that phone come from? What is the technology on it? What is the surveillance of your actions? And then someone turns up at your door half an hour later with a whole cooked meal. Where are the ingredients of that food from? How has it arrived on your doorstep? Who has touched it, at every point? All of this is hidden. And seamless. You don’t even have to feel guilty about the person that you’ve just received the food from. Dont know their name? Doesn’t matter. Ignore their humanity. They might be sleeping in slum housing to be able to do this job.

The thing that I find challenging is that all of that is hidden under layers of smooth technology and who are the people who benefit from that?

My sister sometimes says, can you just enjoy things? Of course! I joke that I’m a champagne communist. Of course I can find joy and enjoy experiences and everything, but I find it challenging that we can be so wilfully blind to the lives of others. And therefore we shape our lives around that wilful blindness.

Shanon: But then they stopped being hidden in a crisis right? Like when we were in the coronavirus pandemic and lockdowns, that’s when we were like, oh look at all the people we depend on – caregivers, transport workers, delivery workers. And then we’re going out and clapping for them every Thursday but only during the crisis. And when the crisis is over? They go back to being hidden.

Bokani: Even when I think about the fact that we were clapping for them every Thursday, humans have such a need to have an act to ritualise their faith. That was something else that I thought came out of that crisis. That, actually, we want to come together to show something in our bodies, in our active ways.

Shanon: And then even that became a double-edged sword when people felt the ritual became co-opted or politicised. It’s like, no, that’s not why we started clapping.

Bokani: And then when those same nurses were like, we need more money to live on? Don’t just clap, thanks. Where was the support for that? These are the things that I struggle with.

End of Part 2
In the next part, Bokani shares more about the advice she would give to her younger self.