Life is... Grand II: Anatomy of Apology (2019), Brandon Covington Sam-Sumana, Installation environment (dimensions variable)

Who owns our stories and our experiences? Who decides how our lives are portrayed to the rest of society? And if we aren’t in control of our own narratives, what does it mean for our own humanity?

Brandon Covington Sam-Sumana’s immersive installation Life is... Grand II: Anatomy of Apology invites us to consider these questions within the context of Mesha Mesh’s e-book, Jus’ Wanna Leave This Ni**a. The story centres around a character called Lyric, who is struggling in her marriage to an abusive womaniser. Mesh wrote the story as a way to touch women who were experiencing or have experienced domestic violence - to recognise an alternative path to a story that often has an all too familiar ending. Covington Sam-Sumana believes that some of the most daring interventions happen in the world of literary fiction, where female and non-binary writers spin narratives depicting themselves thriving, loving and engineering their own freedoms in the face of adversity.

A collection of photographs by artist Redeem Pettaway and objects inspired by a scene from the book place us within the freeze-frame of a moment: asking us to view outsider points of view, to consider why we accept narratives or tropes prescribed to us, and to think about what the bounds of ‘apology’ can ultimately be.