Voodoo / Sorceress

This work turns to the West African and Caribbean Voodoo faith, which in the Western world is so often burdened with prejudice, dogma and a clichéd notion of “black magic”. König breaks those prejudices open: the “sorceress” appears not as a threat but as a dignified, inward-turned mediator between worlds. The glowing red of the background stands for the fiery spiritual energy and the ecstasy of the ritual, while the ashen grey-blue of the face marks the trance, the leaving behind of the worldly plane. The cracked texture points to the vulnerability of a religion that has historically been demonised and suppressed, yet has preserved its identity in the hidden. Cobalt pigment, vermilion, zinc white.