The Pillar of Po Tolo
The Pillar of Po Tolo is an interactive art installation that pays homage to the ancient cosmology and spiritual beliefs of the Dogon people of Mali in West Africa. The sculpture transmits their knowledge of astronomy and sacred science through petroglyphs, symbols, and other indigenous aesthetics.
The philosophy of the installation is to manifest the Dogon people’s mythologies and metaphysical realities. Central to their cosmology is that the Sky God Amma created the first living being named Nommo that transformed and multiplied. They believe the Nommos were inhabitants of a world circling the brightest star in the sky Sirius. They were the great civilizers that came to set up society on Earth. They teach that Po Tolo, the companion star in the Sirius star system, is of the most significance with its egg-shaped orbit. Sirius has been an important star for many cultures since ancient times. However, it was not until 1844 that an astronomer deduced with the aid of a telescope that Sirius was a binary star.
Using forms that interplay, hand patterns that resemble rock art, spiral petroglyphs that connect us to other worlds and higher realms of existence, and symbols from Dogon cosmology, the project is designed to be a gateway and totem of technological activation and communication.
What is Afrofuturism?
Afrofuturism is a cultural and artistic aesthetic which explores the intersections between the arts, history, mythology, science-fiction, and politics from a Black cultural lens. This movement is multi-disciplinary and envisions futures from African and African diasporic experiences. Afrofuturism is personified in the music of Erykah Badu, Earth Wind and Fire, Afrika Bambaataa, George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic, Janelle Monae, Flying Lotus, Sun Ra, FKA Twigs, and more. Writers like Octavia Butler, Samuel Delany, Nnedi Okorafor, and Eve Ewing exemplify it in their works. The influence of Afrofuturism is seen in movies like Black Panther, Brother from Another Planet, and Space is the Place. Artists such as Basquiat, Angelbert Metoyer, Hebru Brantley, and Derrick Adams help personify it visually. The civil rights movement itself can be seen as an example of Afrofuturism as people like Medgar Evers, Thurgood Marshall, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. imagined and helped create a different reality/future where people of color had equal rights. Afrofuturism, in this way, is an aesthetic lens through which one can intersect the past and present to envision the future.
There is a theory in Afrofuturism called Black Quantum Futurism by artist, writer, and activist Rasheedah Phillips. The theory uses art and literature as an approach to living and experiencing reality, by way of manipulating space-time, in order to see possible futures or multiverses. A practical example of this are the traditional divination practices of West African ethnic groups like the Yoruba who use sacred texts and the Ifa Oracle, to understand present conditions, intervene by connecting to the spiritual dimensions, and in turn, manifest different outcomes/futures for their communities.
Come with us on this journey, connect to our history, celebrate our present, and envision our future together with The Solar Shrine Collective.