Edna Manley was a key forebear of Jamaican art history whose work aimed to ennoble the culture and people of her adopted homeland. Negro Aroused (1935), Manley’s most iconic sculpture, is emblematic of her political commitments during a vital period in Jamaican labour history. Elegantly carved from mahogany wood (the artist made a later replica in bronze), the work shows the majestic figure of a man emerging from the overwhelming oppression of colonialism. A burly mass of exaggerated proportions, the figure casts his gaze heavenward, as though aspiring towards another reality, perhaps one unencumbered by economic, social, and racial constraints. At the time the sculpture was made, the Caribbean was gripped by a wave of labour rebellions that saw workers throughout the region protest their low wages and dismal conditions. Negro Aroused, then, is a kind of monument to their ferment and to the revolutionary ardour that galvanised their struggle.
This is the first time the work of Edna Manley is presented at Biennale Arte.
—Ade J. Omotosho
