UAL PhD graduate Samson Kambalu wins Fourth Plinth Commission in Trafalgar Square
- Written byKat Smith
- Published date 16 August 2021
Samson Kambalu, who completed a PhD at UAL from 2011 to 2015, is the first of 2 winning artists selected for the Fourth Plinth.
The Fourth Plinth is one of the world's most famous public art commissions, bringing contemporary art and debate to millions for free and casting a new light on London’s historic Trafalgar Square.
Samson was born in Malawi and is now based in Oxford - he aims to skew our reading of cultural behaviour and customs through work spanning a variety of media, including site-specific installation, video, performance and literature. Samson studied at Chelsea College of Arts, UAL and his PhD is titled Nyau Philosophy: Contemporary Art and the Problematic of the Gift – a Panegyric.
His proposed piece, titled 'Antelope', restages a photograph of Baptist preacher, John Chilembwe - a hero of African independence - and European missionary John Chorley, as a sculpture.
When interviewed about his proposal, Samson said that the original photograph his artwork was based on 'looks ordinary' at a first glance. "But when you research the photograph, you find that actually there's subversion there," he says. "Because at that time in 1914 it was forbidden for Africans to wear hats before white people."
In Samson's design, Chilembwe is significantly larger than the life-size depiction of Chorley. The judges said by increasing his scale, the artist elevated Chilembwe and his story, revealing the hidden narratives of underrepresented people in the history of the British Empire in Africa and beyond.
The year after the photograph was taken, the preacher led a rebellion against colonial rule and died. His church, which had taken years to build, was also destroyed by the colonial police.
Chilembwe inspired figures of black liberation such as Marcus Garvey and WEB Du Bois - at the time of his death, it was to be nearly 50 years before Nyasaland became independent as Malawi in 1964. He is still very much remembered in Malawi with a national day on 15 January and was formerly depicted on banknotes.
Kambalu said he felt “excitement and joy” to be chosen as the next artist on the plinth. “For me this is like a litmus test for how much I belong in British society as an African, a cosmopolitan.”
He added: "When I proposed, this was before Black Lives Matter and George Floyd had been taken into the mainstream and I thought I was just going to be like the underdog, because I had made up my mind that I was going to propose something meaningful to me as an African."
"But we have to start putting detail to the black experience, we have to start putting detail to the African experience, to the post-colonial experience."
Maquettes of the proposed work were on display online and at The National Gallery until 4 July 2021. The public cast their votes until 19 June, which informed the decision of the Fourth Plinth Commissioning Group when selecting the winning sculptures.
'Antelope' has been chosen alongside Teresa Margolles's sculpture, the second selection for the Fourth Plinth which features casts of the faces of 850 trans people. Their artworks were chosen after nearly 17,500 people voted for their favourite.
The two chosen commissions will be unveiled in Trafalgar Square in 2022 and 2024 respectively.
Explore
Find out more about UAL research degrees based at Chelsea College of Arts.