Frida Orupabo and Arthur Jafa's 'Medicine for a Nightmare' at Kunstnernes Hus

The exhibition 'Medicine for a Nightmare' at Kunstnernes Hus in Oslo (1 March–21 April 2019) brought together Norwegian artist Frida Orupabo and American filmmaker Arthur Jafa. Orupabo's high-contrast collaged bodies, pinned against white walls, depict disassembled and reconfigured black figures, referencing Hortense Spillers's concept of the 'ungendering' of black women's bodies. Jafa contributed his video 'Love is the message, the message is Death' (2016), a montage of white-on-black violence set to Kanye West's 'Ultralight Beam'. Orupabo, discovered by Jafa on Instagram, had previously participated in his 2017 exhibition at London's Serpentine Gallery. She uses Instagram (@nemiepeba) as an archive and audience-gathering tool, posting irregularly from her research, including footage from a 1914 Norwegian human zoo. The essay by Shama Khanna critiques the exhibition's context: the white-cube space of Kunstnernes Hus, the potential for spectacularizing black pain, and the contrast between Orupabo's lived reality as a social worker for trafficking victims and the gallery's affluence. Khanna notes that Orupabo's broader social practice and intellectual research remained outside the frame, while Instagram offers more timely and contextual engagement. The exhibition's title references a 'medicine for a nightmare', but Khanna argues the show was at cross-purposes, caught between the artists' intentions and sites.