Call for provocations – What Colour would you Choose 

We invite ten to fifteen minute provocations from speakers in response to topics arising from What Colour Would You Choose, a project initiated by artist Tatiana de Stempel relating to skin colour, identity and race from 19th - 23rd September in London 

Provocations will form part of an event to be held at The Nehru Centre, 8 South Audley Street, London on Thursday 22nd September 2016. 

The event will commence with the film What Colour would you Choose presented by writers Sharmila Chauhan, Dr Meeta Rani Jha and Dr Andrew de Stempel.  What Colour Would you Choose film explores the issues related to the colour of people’s skin and the societal discrimination that it perpetuates across the world. 

Following provocations and discussion, there will then be two performances Hairography: Natural Truth by Harold Offeh which looks at fetishization of hair and particularly European hair in popular culture and Sun Shimmer Instant Tan by Lee Campbell, which relates to the artist’s twenty-year daily routine of applying fake tan to a specific area of his face in order to mask his vitiligo. 

TO APPLY 

Please send a short statement (up to 300 words) of what you would like to speak about in your provocation and a short bio with the subject heading ‘Colour Choose’ to Dr Lee Campbell [log in to unmask] by the end of August. Successful applicants will be notified by the end of the first week of September. 

Learn more about the project 

Join our Facebook page:  https://www.facebook.com/colour.choose 

Twitter: @ColourChoose

Read the reviews: 
Questions of skin colour to the fore
http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-kerala/questions-of-skin-colour-to-the-fore/article8099774.ece

Question of Black and white
http://www.deccanchronicle.com/books-and-art/130116/question-of-black-and-white.html

Watch the film: 
https://www.dropbox.com/s/hhoh0qmh5mnb9b3/what%20colour%20would%20you%20choose%20.mov?dl=0


What Colour would you Choose 

A new show that questions the relevance of skin colour 

London: Here is a new show that would interest the population of London. Opening on the 19 September at The Nehru Centre is the solo show of artist Tatiana de Stempel titled What Colour Would You Choose which explores the issues related to the colour of people’s skin and the societal discrimination that it perpetuates across the world. The exhibition, which is in three parts — a series of portraits in film, photography and painting — looks at the subject of skin colour and racism, which is still relevant today. 

The film explores topics such as race, class, education, jobs and pay. As well as the part skin colour has played in determining opportunities and choices. The photographs are of people sticking out their tongues, because whatever race you belong to everyone has the same colour tongue.  

The paintings are about hair and skin colour in different races. They also address some of changes made to skin colour through fairness creams, botox and surgery.Tatiana, a practicing artist for the last 20 years and a visiting tutor at Central Saint Martins for the past sixteen years, has been working on this project for the last two years.  Tatiana is working with the subject of skin colour and shadism, which has been internalised in countries like the US, India, Pakistan and the Caribbean where there is a thriving market for fairness creams because even within the darker-skinned community there is a prejudice from the past. The origins of colourism are widely believed to come from the pigmentocracy of slavery. 

Tatiana says her project is an ongoing enquiry into what people think about their skin colour; whether they are happy in their own skin; about the discrimination that has gone on in the past because of the colour of people's skin; and how they see the future. If given a choice, What Colour Would They Choose?