The Flash and Flesh of the Spirit.
This article analyzes Senga Nengudi's performance Masked Taping (ca. 1978/79). Adorning her body in pieces of white tape in a dark room, Nengudi moved rapidly before a camera to explore "elements of [her] African heritage of mask making." In so doing, white tape transformed her body into a literal f...
| Publicado en: | Liquid Blackness: Journal of Aesthetics & Black Studies Vol. 10; no. 1; pp. 54 - 72 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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Duke University Press
Apr2026
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=194432431&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 194432431 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 26923874 MU50 jtl: Liquid Blackness: Journal of Aesthetics & Black Studies issn: 26923874 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Apr2026 vid: 10 iid: 1 pid: 71750 pub: Duke University Press artinfo: ui: 194432431 10.1215/26923874-12244576 ppf: 54 ppct: 18 formats: tig: atl: The Flash and Flesh of the Spirit. aug: au: Ames, Amelia su: Mimesis Performance art African art Imaging systems Benjamin, Walter, 1892-1940 Performance artists Art sug: subj: Mimesis Performance art African art Imaging systems Benjamin, Walter, 1892-1940 Performance artists Art keyword: diaspora masquerade mimesis photography Senga Nengudi ab: This article analyzes Senga Nengudi's performance Masked Taping (ca. 1978/79). Adorning her body in pieces of white tape in a dark room, Nengudi moved rapidly before a camera to explore "elements of [her] African heritage of mask making." In so doing, white tape transformed her body into a literal flash of illumination for the camera, while simultaneously creating the visual effect of a spectral flash of a spirit. What, this article asks, is the relation between Nengudi's reclamation of such heritage and the camera? How did her use of technology transform how we understand a mask? To answer these questions, the article compares Robert Farris Thompson's notion of the "flash" in his 1983 classic Flash of the Spirit with Walter Benjamin's theorization of the resurgence of the mimetic faculty in the new visual technologies of modernity. Benjamin offers a way to rethink how mimesis — characteristic of the spirit world Nengudi aimed to "channel" in Masked Taping — returns not through an innate disposition of diasporic peoples but rather through Nengudi's critical use of mimetic technology. The radical legacy of Masked Taping, the article argues, lies in Nengudi's demonstration of how the ancestral arts are always already modern. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y dt: @attributes: year: 2026 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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