Can art be too political? Artist Zineb Sedira sounds off

Editor’s Note: In April 2016, Glenn Lowry, long-time director of New York’s world-renowned Museum of Modern Art, joined CNN Style as guest editor. He commissioned a series of powerful stories on the theme of migration.

Migration, displacement, refugees.

Zineb Sedira has made a name for herself as an artist who addresses such complex topics – and yet, she does not consider her work to be particularly political.

At least not, according to her, in a way which clearly incites political action.

Sedira, who has shown at the Venice Biennale and was nominated for the 2015 Marcel Duchamp Award, discusses the correlation between art and politics in the latest installment of our ‘Soapbox’ series and explains why she has chosen to refrain from making activist art.

The key, for Sedira, is to approach her audience in the right way.

Her photographs and films may contain a message, but it is one that is open to interpretation.

“For me, I think that the type of work I create can reach people more easily – rather than if you create political with a capital P, or activist art – because in some ways, you’re leaving interpretation open for the audience.” Sedira says.

In “Mother Tongue,” a work of visual art from 2002, she filmed separate conversations between her mother, herself and her daughter, in each generation’s native language.

While her mother speaks Arabic, Sedira herself grew up speaking French, and her daughter, who was born in the UK, speaks English.

What resulted was an installation that speaks strongly of both the personal and political implications of migration.

Equally, Sedira’s work is heavily influenced by her parents’ experience of moving from a rural town in Algeria, to Paris in the 1960s.

Having no access to a school, her parents could neither read nor write when they moved to France, and the added language barrier meant that particularly her mother, who stayed home, felt isolated and alone.

The themes of Sedira’s work tie into a universal experience of movement and displacement – an experience that has become increasingly resonant in recent years, where the war in Syria has caused an increasingly tragic refugee crisis.

"Immigration is a very important topic to me because I'm a legacy of that. Both my parents emigrated to France, in the early '60s, I came to the UK in '86."

The Lovers, 2008

Courtesy the artist and kamen mennour, Paris

"Both kinds of migration happened by boat, so the boat became a very interesting pattern and subject in my work."

The Death of a Journey III, 2008

Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris

"When you come from Algeria, even I would say from Morocco and Tunisia, [migration] is a very, not normal, but it's a topic that a lot of people talk about, when you go to Algeria. So many people come and tell you, oh, you know, we would love to go and live there [in France] you're so lucky. It's very much part of my life."

Transitional Landscape, 2006

Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris

"I've made works that look at languages, transmission, immigration, and displacement, and all that through film, video and photography.

I did a very touching piece [Mother Tongue, 2002] where three women -- so three different generations, three different countries, three languages -- are talking to each other in their own mother tongue."

Mother, Daughter and I, 2003

Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris

"I think my work is very relevant to what's happening at the moment. Although it's work that touches on my parents' emigration, which was a long, long time ago, it's funny how things come back. Now, when I hear what's happening with Syria, what's happening in the "Jungle" for example in Calais, it really throws me back to my parents' personal history of emigrating to France. And my own one perhaps, to England."

Floating Coffins, 2009

Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris

"A person that comes into my video space, who looks at the work, can take it where they want. Hopefully they will take the main message but they can also bring their own personal history. Everyone has a history of movement from one country to the other in our days, so someone will connect about a different language, a different place."

Shattered Carcasses, 2008

Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris

"Hopefully I'm making people aware of the complexity, the richness, the negative aspect of it. I'm making them think about and discuss it if they want to."

The Death of a Journey II, 2008

“You know, when I hear what’s happening with Syria, what’s happening in “The Jungle,” for example in Calais, it really kind of throws me back to my parents’ personal history of emigrating to France – and my own one perhaps, to England.” says Sedira.

The artist’s choice of strategy when it comes to the political messages contained in her work, raises questions of how art is used for political purposes, and whether art should take on the big political agendas of our time.

“I’m not saying the other artists who do more sort of activist, political with a big P, art are bad” Sedira clarifies, “I’m just saying it’s a different strategy to bring the message across. My belief is it’s better to be gentle. But I think we need all types of artists to create a very interesting dialogue.”

Video by Oliver Bloor, CNN