We asked fall 2021 intern Sallye to complete a writing activity from our teaching packet for Namsa Leuba: Crossed Looks. She chose Poetry in Motion: When exploring Namsa Leuba: Crossed Looks a lot of descriptive words will come to mind. A fun activity may be using those words to create a poem or song about your favorite photograph, one of the series, or even the whole exhibition. You can work by yourself or with your group, write down single words that pop in your mind, for example: vibrant, serious, exciting. Then once your words or collected, string them together to make a song or poem! 

Below is Sallye’s poem. Why don’t you try it for yourself? You can see this activity and all the other writing prompts by clicking here. Even if you can’t make it into our galleries to do this activity, you can still see Crossed Looks by checking out the virtual exhibition!

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Here is my poem about the Crossed Looks exhibition as a whole for example:

These are the descriptive words I came up with for each series in the exhibition:

Ya Kala Ben, Guinea, 2011: powerful, ethereal, otherworldly, spiritual
The Acrobats, Guinea, 2011: athletic, intimate, strength, agility, talent
Khoisan and Kingdom of Mountains, South Africa, 2014: power, rural, royalty
Plantes, France, 2010: supernatural, monochromatic, primary, basic, building blocks
Tonköma, South Africa, 2015: strength, spiritual, ritualistic, urban, tradition, unique
NGL, Nigeria, 2015: vibrant, youthful, expressive, popping, stylish, modern
Zulu Kids, South Africa, 2015: empowering, political, tradition,
Ndebele Patterns, South Africa, 2014: glitchy, ornament, tradition, intriguing
Weke, Benin, 2017: hypnotic, intimate, spiritual, otherworldly, supernatural, phantom, ambiguous, ethereal, celestial
Illusions, Tahiti, 2019: alluring, vibrant, glamorous, romantic, captivating, beguiling, tropical
Cocktail, 2011: exotic, contemporary, vibrant, dynamic, fashion, aesthetic
The African Queens, 2012: empowering, pastel, contemporary

This is the poem I wrote, drawing on the descriptive words lists I created for the different series. 

Spiritual, traditional, and powerful is Africa through Namsa Leuba’s lens.
Supernatural monochromatic details in Plantes signifies the building blocks of the vibrancy of the people.

Spirituality in the people
Celestial, hypnotic, ethereal, otherworldly spirits captured powerful spirituality through Namsa’s lens in Weke and Ya Kala Ben

Tradition in the people
Traditions are computerized to create intriguing, glitchy, ornament designs

Standing tall; a spiritual, traditional ritual is urbanized and becomes a unique fashion editorial

Power in the people
Namsa’s vision creates a powerful, royal, unidentifiable rural territory
Acrobats shows the strength, agility, and talent of the people through intimate portraits
Youthful spirits pave way for modern, vibrant forms of self-expression
Empowered youths continue to stand and fight with the youths who fought against inequality
Exoticism is used to empower in vibrant, alluring, glamorous, dynamic, contemporary photoshoots. 

 

Images:
Top – Installation image of Namsa Leuba: Crossed Looks. Photograph by Rick Rhodes
Middle – Namsa Leuba, the Plantes series: Blue, 2010, Red, 2010, Yellow, 2010, archival pigment prints on Dibond, France
Bottom – Namsa Leuba, from the Illusions series, La femme aux coris, 2019, La femme à la papaye II, 2019, Lèvres rouge, 2019, archival pigment prints on Dibond, Tahiti