Yinka Shonibare MBE

Here's the deal: much of Africa is poor and war-torn because, historically, it has been plundered and exploited by the west. It's an unpleasant fact that UK artist Yinka Shonibare MBE wants to highlight. But he's doing it not with earnest images of starving children wielding AK-47s, but with colourful, fanciful scenes of wealthy Europeans at play.

Shonibare is best known for his sculptural set-ups involving headless mannequins recreating French and English paintings from the 18th century. He's particularly keen on the Rococo, the flouncy, decorative style that flourished in France during the reign of Louis XV. Rococo artists painted the aristocracy enjoying themselves while the vast majority of the French were eating dirt and fomenting revolution.

"The use of Rococo is an expression of expense, excess and decadence," says Shonibare, 46. "That level of expense is always based on the labour of less fortunate people. Rather than depicting the poverty of Africa what I do is embody the excess and become complicit with that."

Shonibare was born in London in 1962 but raised in Lagos, Nigeria. Returning to the UK at the age of 17, he studied painting at Byam Shaw School of Art and at Goldsmiths College, London. As an art student he became interested in the Perestroika era of Soviet history. "Because of my African origin one of my tutors said: 'Why aren't you producing authentic African art?' It's a bit like asking a European artist to make medieval art."

His work now embraces sculpture, painting, installation, photography and film. He was part of the seminal 1997 Sensation exhibition of Young British Artists and was nominated for the Turner Prize in 2004. The mid-career survey at the Museum of Contemporary Art covers 12 years of his practice. "Even though Yinka's work is historical in origins, the issues are very pressing today," says the MCA's Rachel Kent, who curated the exhibition.

"The relationship between the colonised and the coloniser is the basis of a lot of what I do," the artist explains, "but it's a love-hate relationship. On the one hand I actually aspire to [the coloniser's] power, but at the same time I loathe that power. It's not a simple critique."

The irony of the fact that he was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire is not lost on him. "I insist on using 'MBE' after my name because I like the contradiction. I find it difficult to know whether it's a celebration or a critique."

Shonibare - sorry, Shonibare MBE - has no doubt his work will resonate with Australian audiences. "I think people have an understanding of post-colonial experience here," he says, "given that the Queen is still your head of state."

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