Kiss Java

There’s a rich variety of local cultures that make up the daily culture of Mauritius.  The influences of the African, Indian, French, and Chinese come together here, and it’s entwined in the history and languages of the place.  It’s a spectacular place to see, and spectacularly interesting to get to know.  The island of Mauritius has many sides, and it’s never possible to see all of them in one visit, or perhaps even in one lifetime.  The writers and poets here spend hours every day putting words to capture the place, but it always escapes, it always runs or swims away, and reveals another side at another hour.  Some of the best views of nature in the world are here, and it makes sense that one can find the best hotels.  Mauritius is like a waking dream.

It’s just as complicated, and absolutely as fascinating, as most dreams, and it’s a strange sensation to be here when things start to blend together, that lazy part of the day when sleepy visions start to call.  This is a splendid place to be for poets, of course, where the rhythms of the world seem more intense that anywhere else, and always more slow.  It comes through in the music as well as the visual art.  Mauritius is a great place for artists, because even the most jaded tourists wind up being inspired by something here.  And the ones whose first inspirations came when they were living on the soil never forget what gave them that light of consciousness.

Here we can look at the work of Serge Gerard Selvon.  He was born here in 1941, and went to Germany in the 60s on a DAAD fellowship, which woke something up in the work.  He later moved to France, and ended up living permanently in Germany, and has been there since the early 1970s.  Selvon works in themes that are particular to Mauritius, and speak to his experience as an insider-outsider, and living in many different worlds at once.  The sculptural forms are shocking and fantastic, calling up images of contemporary body art while at the same time reflecting an aesthetic that has visual roots in African animism.  There are many complicated worlds and forms, as well as languages at play, and all point toward an art that reflects backwards on the future, pulling its own roots into a gorgeous unknown.

No related posts.