n° 132 - Autumn 2022

Enfleshing Flesh: An Interview with Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi


This interview was conducted in the context of issue 132 of Espace art actuel on the theme of “Flesh.” Mlondi and I met at Northwestern University, Chicago, in the Department of Performance studies, where we were part of the same PhD cohort. Both of us being interested in questions of the body; movement and power; and epistemologies of performance, we gradually developed a dialogue between our areas of research. Mlondi’s scholarship and interdisciplinary artistic practice focuses on contemporary Black performance and art history, an area of study he has used to expand the discourse in Dance and Performance Studies as well as Art History.

 

Didier Morelli: I first became aware of the theoretical richness of the concept of flesh through your work. Can you explain how you situate flesh?

Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi: I am intrigued by your use of “theoretical richness” and “wealth” to refer to flesh. “Flesh” in common parlance, or Biblical referencing, is often invoked to elaborate upon a certain moral debasement and an attachment to “worldly” material. In certain instances, “flesh” is used to make claims of kinship/inheritance (i.e., “flesh of my flesh”). In certain critical scholarly discourses, “flesh” names a certain bio-/necro-political restriction or total annulment of (the capacity for) human life. For others, “flesh” is that immediate subcutaneous and pulsating substance that functions as a repository for memory and “lived” experience.

Your question about flesh’s theoretical richness encourages


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Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2018. ICA Live Art, Cape Town. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2018. ICA Live Art, Cape Town. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2018. ICA Live Art, Cape Town. Performance documentation (feat. Thamsanqa Majela). Courtesy of the artist.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2018. ICA Live Art, Cape Town. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2018. ICA Live Art, Cape Town. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2020. Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Leah Kaplan.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2020. Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Leah Kaplan.
Mlondolozi (Mlondi) Zondi, the most efficient, most collegial negro in the whole entire world (Ariel’s treatise), 2020. Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Performance documentation. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Leah Kaplan.