Reckoning with Colonial Art: Yinka Shonibare's Mr. and Mrs. Andrews Without Their Heads
Thomas Gainsborough, Mr and Mrs Andrews, c.1750, oil on canvas, 119.4 x 69.8 cm. National Gallery, London, UK
Thomas Gainsborough’s iconic Mr and Mrs Andrews (c.1750) depicts a serene countryside scene as the happy couple sits in front of their expansive estate. Now imagine these figures had no heads. Yinka Shonibare’s Mr and Mrs Andrews without their Heads (1998) transforms this tranquil scene into a radical critique of colonialism, revealing the deep connection between the landscape genre and imperial power.
Gainsborough’s Mr. and Mrs. Andrews is an iconic piece of British art that represents the power of the British upper class. This large-scale landscape painting shows Robert Andrews and his wife Frances among the land they own as a visual testament to their wealth and status, yet a closer look reveals the complex power dynamic of the time. Much of the power and riches of the British elite during this time were built through colonial expansion, slavery, and the exploitation of resources from other countries. While Mr. and Mrs. Andrews doesn’t depict any overt symbols of colonialism, like exotic goods or enslaved labourers, the wealth represented was part of a larger colonial network. By the 1750s, the British Empire was expanding in the Caribbean, India, and North America, creating new avenues for wealth accumulation that benefited people like the Andrews family. Gainsborough’s work, therefore, portrays an idealised vision of British prosperity that, although framed in rural tranquillity, is inextricably linked to colonial exploitation and global networks of economic power.
Shonibare’s reimagining of this portrait is nothing short of radical. Immediately striking is the absence of the couple’s heads. By decapitating his subjects, Shonibare not only disrupts their serenity but symbolises the dismantling of colonial and aristocratic power structures. This artistic beheading also places the focus onto the clothing of these figures. Rather than wearing the traditional 18th century attire, the couple are dressed in brightly coloured wax printed fabrics, commonly associated with African identity and culture. These textiles have their own colonial history; originally produced in Europe for Indonesian markets, they were later adopted in West Africa and became a symbol of African resistance and independence. By dressing the decapitated couple in these fabrics, Shonibare highlights global connections and histories of colonialism, identity, and appropriation.
Shonibare’s work is more than just a parody of an old painting, it questions the way that history is written, remembered, and represented. He disrupts the typical Eurocentric perspective by reclaiming and revising the narrative of this painting. Shonibare often refers to himself as a "postcolonial hybrid," and his art reflects the tensions of living between cultures. Born in London but raised in Nigeria, Shonibare’s identity is deeply intertwined with the legacies of colonialism, as are the fabrics he uses in his works.
Yinka Shonibare, Leeds 2023, photo by David Lindsay
Mr. and Mrs. Andrews Without Their Heads invites viewers to take a second look and consider the hidden histories behind the façade of classical Western art. Shonibare forces us to confront the uncomfortable truths about the British Empire and its reliance on exploitation, slavery, and the dehumanisation of others. In his version of the painting, the landscape no longer exudes tranquillity but rather discomfort. It speaks of displacement and loss, of identities erased or forcibly constructed by colonial power.