'South African Visual Culture' - a new perspective
by Kresta Tyler Johnson
A collection of essays by South African academics is being published in February and investigates the idea of visual culture in South Africa and the necessity of society to critically engage with the visual imagery surrounding them.
Numerous individuals have contributed to the publication, which will include a range of essays focusing upon mass consumer culture imposed by shopping malls, advertising, and journals, to probing issues of representation of individuals by visual media and questions around youth identity.
The book is entitled South African Visual Culture and already has Professor Nicholas Mirzoeff of State University in New York claiming that, 'with the publication of this volume, a certain intellectual moment is complete. So whatever visual culture is, it can no longer be called new or emergent. This volume could be taken to mark the closure of the first moment of visual culture and the phase of globalisation that began with the televised release from prison of Nelson Mandela.'
Those are lofty claims for the publication but, edited by University of Pretoria lecturers Jeanne van Eeden and Amanda du Preez, and including contributors such as Michael Herbst, Sandra Klopper, Brenda Schmahmann, Louise Viljoen and Liese van der Watt among others, the reading sounds tantalising.
Hopefully by next month I will be able to obtain a copy to review how this new publication will add to, engage with, provoke, or disappoint further discourses on the state of visual culture in South Africa.
