Daring to Redefine History: Charmaine Watkiss Transforms a Museum’s Narrative
What if the stories we’ve been told are only half the picture? Artist Charmaine Watkiss is on a mission to uncover the hidden threads of history, weaving them into a tapestry that honors the voices often left in the shadows. Her journey begins in the bustling streets of London’s Elephant and Castle, where, as a child, she accompanied her mother to G Baldwin’s, a centuries-old herbalist shop. This wasn’t just any store—it was a sanctuary for Black women in the 1970s and 80s, a place where natural remedies and ancestral wisdom were shared freely. But here’s where it gets controversial: Watkiss’s work challenges us to ask, What if the knowledge of the enslaved wasn’t just lost, but carried forward, shaping cultures in ways we’ve yet to fully acknowledge?
Watkiss, whose mother was part of the Windrush generation, draws deeply from her Caribbean heritage and the transatlantic slave trade’s botanical legacy. Her 2021 exhibition, The Seed Keepers, explored the plant-based connections between the Caribbean, the UK, and Africa, sparking a bold assertion: The enslaved didn’t just survive—they thrived, preserving and sharing their botanical knowledge across continents. This idea birthed her striking illustrated portraits of African-descended women alongside medicinal plants, a visual homage to resilience and survival.
Now, Watkiss is turning heads at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum (RAMM) in Exeter, where she’s been commissioned to engage with the museum’s collection. And this is the part most people miss: She immediately noticed a glaring absence in the West Africa display—the story of the diaspora. Determined to fill this void, she shifted her medium from drawing to sculpture, inspired by RAMM’s collection of African masks. Her mukenga helmet mask, traditionally made with cowrie shells and glass beads, now sits alongside others in the museum’s cabinet, sparking a dialogue about ownership, representation, and cultural exchange. Is it enough to display these artifacts, or do we need to confront the histories they carry?
Watkiss’s path to becoming an artist was anything but linear. From facing discrimination as a footwear designer in the 1980s to being told by a film tutor that “Black people made no contribution to western civilization,” she’s no stranger to adversity. Her response? A dissertation proving him wrong. In 2015, she took a leap of faith, quitting her job and enrolling in an MA in illustration. Here’s the bold part: She credits her practice of reiki for giving her the courage to “hurl herself into the unknown,” a metaphor for her artistic journey and her approach to challenging historical narratives.
This isn’t Watkiss’s first rodeo with museum collections. Her research fellowship at the Sloane Lab uncovered the role of enslaved Africans in collecting healing plants for figures like Hans Sloane, whose legacy is intertwined with colonialism and exploitation. Her recent work at London’s National Portrait Gallery reimagines a woman Sloane wrote about as a “queen in her own country,” reclaiming her story from the margins. But here’s the question: Can art truly heal the generational trauma embedded in these institutions, or does it simply expose the wounds?
Watkiss’s exhibition, For the Ones Who Came Before …, invites us to confront these questions head-on. By centering the healer on a throne adorned with the sankofa bird—a symbol of looking back to move forward—she challenges us to rethink who deserves to be at the heart of history. So, what do you think? Can art rewrite the past, or is it doomed to repeat its silences? Leave your thoughts in the comments—let’s keep the conversation going.
