Willie Cole USA, b. 1955

In this wooden wall work, Willie Cole uses the scorch marks from irons to represent African American faces. Cole associates the shape of irons and the scorch marks they create with African masks. He connects the heat energy of irons with the African deities Shango, the god of thunder and lightning, and Ogun, the god of iron and metal work. "I think that when one culture is dominated by another culture, the energy or powers or gods of the previous culture hide in the vehicles of the new cultures,” Cole has said. “I think the spirit of Shango is a force hidden in the iron because of the fire, and the power of Ogun--his element is iron--is also hidden in these metal objects.” Cole has likened the shape of ironing boards to the shape of slave ships. He has used both ironing boards and irons to draw connections between the African slave trade and its legacy, African American domestic labor. In this work, the burn marks are evocative of African masks. They are created by the “sole” of the iron, suggesting 20 souls removed from their home, family, and life, masked, anonymous, and scorched, but memorialized.