Tracey Rose: Shooting Down Babylon

Zeitz MOCAA presents a retrospective of the revolutionary work of Tracey Rose (b. 1974, South Africa). Including work spanning from 1996 to 2019.

The title of the exhibition derives from an iconic installation Shooting Down Babylon (The Art of War)(2016), which reflects on varied exorcist and cleansing rituals from non-Western communities. The work points to several themes that stem from post-colonial entanglements such as repatriation, recompense and reckoning and epitomises the wide-ranging medium and concerns that are prevalent in Rose’s practice.

The exhibition encompasses film, sculpture, photography, performance, print, painting and multi-layered participatory elements, with the body and performance  being central. For Rose, the body, often her own body, is a site for protest, outrage, resistance and pertinent discourse. It is a channel for the demonstration of exasperation, aggravation, disruption and paradox.