In the atrium of the Tetley sits a gigantic, playful, immersive installation by Tai Shani. Elsewhere in the gallery are films, posters and paintings by Polish artist Ariela Widzer. These works conclude the multidisciplinary, London-based artist’s 4-year long Dark Continent project: the starting point of which was Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies (1405). Pizan fashioned a city of historical and fictional women in her early feminist work; in response, Shani has developed twelve monologues focusing on women throughout mythology and history. In a show that blends feminism, queer theory, science fiction and anthropology, visitors are encouraged to envisage intertwined cosmologies and post-patriarchal societies.
Tai Shani: Semiramis, The Tetley, Leeds, 20 July – 14 October 2018
