Menskleur
The term “flesh colour/skin colour/menskleur” is introduced to us from school-level as the pale peach crayon; the point of reference for the colour of human beings. The introduction of this terminology so early in childhood artistic expression perpetuates a dominant status quo of white skin as not only supreme, but standard, and negates the existence of blackness and melanin through a total lack of representation.
This insidious instance of racism extends into the adult art world as well, where at most South African art supply retailers, one will find the majority of established paint brands using the term “flesh colour”, “flesh tint” and “flesh base” to identify this particular shade of pale.
By deliberately contrasting paint that is widely identified and branded as “flesh colour” in South Africa, against actual skin, this image seeks to depict the existence of white hegemony in the art world.
Decolonising Paint
The purpose of this image is to decolonize the paint brands that use the term “flesh colour” to define a shade of paint associated exclusively with white skin, despite a host of other naming possibilities including peach, coral and salmon. The brands that continue to use this term reductively only to identify a pale shade of skin associated with whiteness, as found in South African retailers include:
· Reeves
· Dala
· Iris
· Winsor & Newton
· Lucas Cryl Studio
· Lucas Cryl Pastos
Although part of a much greater systemic racism, this instance applies to oil and acrylic paint and is thus imbedded in the practice of art, which should be a progressive space that pushes against oppressive structures. Instead, at the very heart of a dominant art medium, we have “flesh colour” devoid of melanin. It is for this reason that these brands should be called out and challenged.
White Face
On the face of a person of colour, the widely branded “flesh colour” paint depicts an instance of White Face. In stark contrast to Black Face, White Face does not indicate an attempt to mock, denigrate or homogenize, it instead reflects the reality that white remains the most accepted and represented shade to be.
The undertone here is that the colour of human beings has become synonymous with the colour of white human beings only, through branding, dominant discourse and socialization. White Face, in this image, seeks to create a new point of reference: Black as the standard and the norm, while white is used to refer to the other; the non-black. It is through exploring these radical inversions that the work aims to highlight the currently accepted structures of racial subjugation and their undeniable presence in both our psyches and our physical world.
Menskleur
The term “flesh colour/skin colour/menskleur” is introduced to us from school-level as the pale peach crayon; the point of reference for the colour of human beings. The introduction of this terminology so early in childhood artistic expression perpetuates a dominant status quo of white skin as not only supreme, but standard, and negates the existence of blackness and melanin through a total lack of representation.
This insidious instance of racism extends into the adult art world as well, where at most South African art supply retailers, one will find the majority of established paint brands using the term “flesh colour”, “flesh tint” and “flesh base” to identify this particular shade of pale.
By deliberately contrasting paint that is widely identified and branded as “flesh colour” in South Africa, against actual skin, this image seeks to depict the existence of white hegemony in the art world.
Decolonising Paint
The purpose of this image is to decolonize the paint brands that use the term “flesh colour” to define a shade of paint associated exclusively with white skin, despite a host of other naming possibilities including peach, coral and salmon. The brands that continue to use this term reductively only to identify a pale shade of skin associated with whiteness, as found in South African retailers include:
· Reeves
· Dala
· Iris
· Winsor & Newton
· Lucas Cryl Studio
· Lucas Cryl Pastos
Although part of a much greater systemic racism, this instance applies to oil and acrylic paint and is thus imbedded in the practice of art, which should be a progressive space that pushes against oppressive structures. Instead, at the very heart of a dominant art medium, we have “flesh colour” devoid of melanin. It is for this reason that these brands should be called out and challenged.
White Face
On the face of a person of colour, the widely branded “flesh colour” paint depicts an instance of White Face. In stark contrast to Black Face, White Face does not indicate an attempt to mock, denigrate or homogenize, it instead reflects the reality that white remains the most accepted and represented shade to be.
The undertone here is that the colour of human beings has become synonymous with the colour of white human beings only, through branding, dominant discourse and socialization. White Face, in this image, seeks to create a new point of reference: Black as the standard and the norm, while white is used to refer to the other; the non-black. It is through exploring these radical inversions that the work aims to highlight the currently accepted structures of racial subjugation and their undeniable presence in both our psyches and our physical world.
