Fred Wilson

Untitled (Zimbabwe)

Fred Wilson’s flag paintings document the 20th century history of African people, indexing the period of liberation from colonialism. As the majority of African flags were created during the 1950s and 60s, they were intended to reflect a so-called ‘modern’ aesthetic and ideology. Many African flags maintain the typical flag tropes such as stripes, stars, birds, and blocks of primary and secondary colors; green to represent the land; blue to symbolize the ocean or sky; and red to recall the violence that occured in the pursuit of liberty. These colors indicate tribal, cultural, religious, national, and political identities. Some African flags, however, also contain black, representing the people, in order to distinguish them from the European countries that colonized them. 

Focusing on the significance of this black, Fred Wilson pushes this aesthetic to the extreme by creating a series of painting flags that strips them of the colors, reducing them to their most basic components. Untitled (Zimbabwe) features raw cotton canvas, overlain with a series of horizontal black stripes, the middle of which has been filled in black. To the left, a triangle containing a star and the national bird of Zimbabwe is rendered in graphic precision. Through the absence of color, Wilson’s paintings call attention to the dynamic and mutable nature of African nations, their identities, and their histories, but also the loss experienced in the pursuit of sovereignty.