Kabare

In Kabare, Nazareth recreates the name of the prison Kabare in the South Kivu Province in the Democratic Republic of Congo in a luminous sculpture. Capital letters are formed by light bulbs mounted on plywood in this billboard—like steel structure. Kabare is one of several high-security prisons and penal colonies referenced in Nazareth’s work. In these installations, the names of places of detention and violence appear like advertising signs for entertainment venues, like the facades of theaters or the blinking lights of night clubs and bars. Nazareth harnesses the captivating power of this aesthetic to amplify the visibility of locations that receive minimal or no attention by mainstream media. Specifically, Kabare calls attention to the relationship between incarceration and colonial power, shedding light on the lethal treatment of colonial subjects and the imprisonment of Black men. The work serves as a reminder that African prisons are not autochthonous institutions but rather the remnants of colonialism.

(Text written by TBA21 and used as a wall label for the exhibition "Remedios", C3A, Cordoba, 2023)