Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska – Zanzibar

Lubaina Himid, a pioneer of the British Black Arts Movement, steps away from her typical figurative storytelling in this collaborative installation with Magda Stawarska. At its heart is the Zanzibar series, a group of abstract diptychs painted in 1999 as a tribute to Himid’s birthplace—a landscape she left as an infant following her father's early death. These canvases, once solitary reflections on grief and belonging, are now transformed by Stawarska’s multi-layered soundscape, creating a bridge between the artist’s past and her current creative partnership.

You're watching nine pairs of canvases float within the gallery, suspended amidst geometric forms and rhythmic zigzag patterns. The air is thick with a 38-minute libretto of voices, operatic fragments, and the sounds of Taraab music, echoing through the room like a distant radio broadcast from the island. You see actual cloves embedded in the paint and the delicate splatter of rose-colored acrylic, physical anchors for memories of a childhood that was largely imagined through the stories of others.