Mayet’s sculptures confess to an existential orientation towards the making of other worlds. They refer to a wholeness that has been somehow lost, due to what the artist perceives to be the decay of history in today’s ruinous society. Mayet takes the tree as a symbolic icon capable of withstanding these disastrous conditions, creating objects that exist in the image of them. Cuba’s trees being associated with a symbolic mysticism, which comes from links with the Yorubic religion brought over by African slaves. Mayet’s sculptures refer to the ritual in in which people prayed before the trees, burying various offerings in and around their roots. Animal sacrifices, which formed part of the ancestral ritual, are evident in Mayet’s application of bird feathers used by the artist to form a dialogue between trees the deep roots of their historical and religious symbolism.

© Osei Bonsu, 2014