The Dutchman
By: Moyo Okediji
Acrylic on canvas

Waves of Panic

I wandered to the second floor of the Ackland Art Museum on UNC’s campus, and found a piece that impressed me from the very first glance. The Dutchman, a painting by the Nigerian artist, Moyo Okediji, depicts the middle passage journey of slaves from Africa to the New World. Okediji uses bright colors, wavy lines, and curvy shapes to convey chaos and confusion to the viewer. The busy and complex composition makes the viewers eyes dart around the canvas, making it more difficult to make out the scene. In order to understand the painting, the viewer must stop and take more time to appreciate its value, which is a tribute to the slaves who suffered the journey of the middle passage.

I was first attracted to the piece by its impressive size (about five by six feet), the exquisite colors, swirled shapes, the complexity, and the way the artist broke the figures up into many smaller blocks of colors, conveying a sense of movement. From far away the scene looks like a bunch of overlapping shapes and curvy lines painted in cheerful, intense colors, predominantly: orange, purple, blue, yellow, turquoise, aqua, black, and brown. However, once the viewer comes closer, and takes time to evaluate the painting, he/she quickly realizes that the subject matter of the painting is actually quite morbid. The juxtaposition of the happy, bright colors with the depressing subject matter may seem strange, but I think that the artist utilized the high-intensity colors to pull the viewers eye to several directions at once. It was physically difficult for me to look at one part of the painting for a long time. My eye kept darting all over the canvas. This makes it hard for the viewer to organize the figures into cognitive groups and sort out a narrative of what is happening in the painting. I had a difficult time making out what shapes comprised the bodies of the figures and sorting out how they were interacting. The large scale chaos overwhelms the viewer, along with hints of intense emotion such as the big blue tears on the cheeks of two women and people wailing in chains. There is confusion and a feeling of helplessness; things seem out of control. Okediji’s chaos unsettles his viewers because he has made it difficult for them to form clarity and receive answers to their questions about the painting.

I wanted answers, so I read the placard on the wall next to the painting. It described the scene and helped me identify groups of figures. On the left, a Dutchman grabs the arm of a crying slave woman. Another Dutchman, next to her, turns his head away from her tearful face. There is another crying woman to the right and then several chained men wail in the upper middle of the painting. On the right side of the painting, a ship clearly labeled “DUTCH” sails on rocky waves. In the middle of the painting there is a large upside-down figure plunging into the water, joining other figures in the shark-infested waters in the lower part of the painting.

Even after reading about the content of the painting, it was still difficult for me to identify every part of the painting. There is no differentiation between the foreground, middle ground, and background of the painting. The time of day is also questionable because there is both a sun and a moon in the painting. There are hardly any straight lines, making it hard for the viewer to focus on one thing at a time. In fact, it is hard to tell what one figure or object is composed of because they are broken up into multiple blocks of color. It is challenging for the eye to make wholes out of the figures and objects, and it instead makes wholes along the lines and among the patches of color dispersed throughout the painting. This is because, optically, the viewer groups together things that are contained within the same lines or are the same color. Okediji forces the eye to jolt all over the painting, struggling to distinguish separate parts. Eye movement of this nature is similar to how the eye would evaluate a real-life, chaotic situation. Okediji may be trying to help his viewers identify with the trauma that slaves in this confusing chaos would have gone through. Everywhere you look in the painting, you catch glimpses of disturbing things: crying women, abuse, drowning, and death, sharks eating corpses, chains, wailing, and the degradation of the human spirit.

The swirling shapes and rippling lines also mimic waves. If the undulating lines are interpreted as water, it could also be argued the Okediji was trying to paint the scene from the perspective of someone under the water. The viewer is looking at the situation from the sea, from the viewpoint of someone that has just been thrown overboard. This evokes a sense of panic because someone in that situation faces certain death from drowning, hunger, dehydration, or sharks and these were all sufferings that the slaves on the middle passage journey had to endure.

I was so absolutely captivated by this work of art that I could not stop staring at it. Truthfully, I had a hard time turning away from it. Okediji employs several techniques to help viewers identify with the plight and agony of his ancestors such as: long swirling lines, curvy shapes, bright color, and the depiction of strong emotion and chaos. Okediji probably has a psychological and sentimental connection to his ancestors who were lost in the Atlantic and who survived in the New World and The Dutchmen allows his viewers to feel this same connection.