Dominique White presents "Deadweight"

Max Mara Art Prize for Women
Dominique White: Deadweight

2 July – 15 September 2024
Whitechapel Gallery, London
Gallery 2, free
 

Dominique White (b.1993, UK), winner of the ninth edition of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women, presents a new body of work, Deadweight.

A thought-provoking exploration of rebellion and transformation, Deadweight comprises four large-scale sculptural works which continue the artist's interest in creating new worlds for ‘Blackness’ and fascination with the metaphoric potency and regenerative power of the sea.  

The title Deadweight derives from a nautical term which collapses everything on a ship into a single unit which determines the ship’s ability to float and function as intended. White deliberately inverts this, offering disruption as opposed to stability - a reckoning with the tipping point of the ship to offer the possibility of emancipation through abolition. 

The works combine force and fragility: undulating angular structures formed from metals manipulated into forms evocative of anchors, a ship's hull, mammal carcasses or skeletons - lost or abandoned material forms that, through White’s treatment, become symbols of defiance.

As part of the process, the sculptures were immersed in the Mediterranean Sea: both a physical and poetic gesture to explore the transformative effect of water on material objects. The resulting forms display the rust and oxidation of the metals, the fragmentation of organic elements, such as sisal, raffia and driftwood, as well as carrying the lingering scent of seawater. 

The new commission weaves together concepts of Afrofuturism, Afro-pessimism and Hydrarchy - philosophies central to White’s research and artistic practice. Her work envisions an Afro future, located outside of traditional utopian science fiction, in an oceanic realm with the potential to offer fluid, rebellious realities, liberated from capitalist and colonial influence. White’s sculptures, or ‘beacons’, recall sea-bound, imagined worlds which prophesise the emergence of the Stateless: “a [Black] future that hasn’t yet happened, but must.”

Deadweight was developed from White’s winning proposal for the ninth edition of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women and realised during a six-month residency organised by Collezione Maramotti.

Specifically tailored to support, inform and help realise the work, the residency saw White travel through Agnone, Palermo, Genoa, Milan and Todi, working with academics, researchers and specialists in naval and maritime history and the Mediterranean slave trade, as well as visiting historic foundries and artisan workshops, learning new skills from experts in historic, traditional and contemporary metalworking techniques.

The biannual Max Mara Art Prize for Women was established in 2005 and is a collaboration between Whitechapel Gallery, Max Mara and Collezione Maramotti. It is the only visual art prize of its kind for UK-based emerging women-identifying artists, aiming to promote and nurture them at a crucial stage in their careers through increased visibility, and the space, time and resources to develop an ambitious new work. Previous prize winners are: Emma Talbot, Helen Cammock, Emma Hart, Corin Sworn, Laure Prouvost, Andrea Büttner, Hannah Rickards and Margaret Salmon.

The judging panel for the ninth Max Mara Art Prize for Women was chaired by Bina von Stauffenberg, joined by a panel of art-world experts comprising gallerist Rózsa Farkas, artist Claudette Johnson, writer Derica Shields, collector Maria Sukkar and Whitechapel Gallery Director, Gilane Tawadros.

Following its presentation at Whitechapel Gallery, Deadweight will travel to Collezione Maramotti in Reggio Emilia, Italy (27 Oct 24 - 16 Feb 25).