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26/7/05
7:03 pm
Page 38
Drum: PHOTOGENIC
Like any Japanese man should be
proud of his culture; any Italian proud of his culture; I’m an AfricanCaribbean man who needs to be,
has to be, proud of his culture. I
believe strongly in taking a cultural
stance to my art and using that as
the foundation by which to reach
out to the rest of the world. And I
take that very, very personally, very
seriously. But these days, it’s all just
a celebrity TV situation. It’s a Big
Brother scenario. It’s reality TV and
it’s a pop world. And it totally
counteracts where other cultures
may be coming from, so if you’re
not assimilating then you’re gonna
be on the outside. And it’s a real offkey scenario because you can’t ask
me to be proud and come and
present “what I am” and then
tell me I must do it in a
particular protocol, and say to
me at the same time that
colonialism is dead.
Kitty, England