Archive: Issue No. 131, July 2008

6.07.08 Ângela Ferreira and Manthia Diawara at Michael Stevenson
6.07.08 Guy Tillim at Michael Stevenson
6.07.08 'Mental Pictures' at blank projects
6.07.08 Nomusa Makhubu at Alliance Française
6.07.08 Sibusiso Duma, Strijdom van der Merwe and Randolph Hartzenberg at AVA
6.07.08 Norman O'Flynn and Gabrielle Alberts at blank projects
6.07.08 Kate Gottgens at Rose Korber

8.06.08 'Between Meaning and Matter' at Bell-Roberts
8.06.08 'Prints + Editions' at Whatiftheworld / Gallery
8.06.08 Louise Linder at João Ferreira
8.06.08 'Baring' at AVA

STELLENBOSCH

6.08.08 'Abstract South African Art from the Isolation Years: Volume II' at SMAC

PAARL

10.02.08 Andy Goldsworthy and Ouattara Watts at Glen Carlou

Ângela Ferreira's new work is accompanied by the first screening in Africa of Maison Tropicale by Manthia Diawara, commissioned on the occasion of Ferreira's participation in the 2007 Venice Biennale. Ferreira's work, For Mozambique (model no. 2 for a screen-orator-kiosk celebrating the post-independence utopia), 2008, is based on a 1922 design for an agitprop kiosk by the Russian Constructivist Gustav Klucis. The structure, with its reference to the political optimism following the Russian revolution in the 1920s, is surmounted by a screen on which Ferreira presents two films that in turn reflect the euphoria surrounding Mozambique's independence from colonial rule in the mid-1970s.

Born in 1958 in Maputo, Mozambique, Ferreira grew up in South Africa and obtained her MFA from Michaelis. She lives and works in Lisbon, and was chosen to represent Portugal at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007. For her Venice work, Maison Tropicale, Ferreira continued her investigations into the ways in which European modernism adapted, or failed to adapt, to the realities of the African continent by tracing the history of Jean Prouve's Maison Tropicale or 'tropical house'.

The making of Ferreira's Maison Tropicale is the subject of a film by Diawara, which follows the artist's visits to the sites where the prototypes of the houses were installed in Brazzaville in the Republic of the Congo and Niamey in Niger, as well as the subsequent 'reclamation' of the prototypes by the Western art world. The 58-minute film will be screened at the gallery throughout the run of the exhibition.

Diawara, who was born in Mali, is Professor of Comparative Literature and Film, and Director of the Institute of African-American Affairs at New York University. He has published several books on black culture, film and literature including African Cinema: Politics and Culture (1992) and We Won't Budge (2003). His films include Bamako Sigi Kan (2001) and Conakry Kas (2004).

Opens: July 10
Closes: August 23

Guy Tillim's new body of work reflects on the civic architecture conceived in the idealism of the last years of colonialism and the immediate post-colonial period in Africa. In the French and Portuguese colonies, in particular, modernist architecture was used expressly to convey the ideology of the era. The utopian colonial vision was flawed, and the structures were a strange and fragile hybrid of aspirations and ideas that were not necessarily applicable to Africa. However, through subsequent shifts in power, this architecture has been absorbed into an indisputably African reality, and today these buildings and civic spaces are an integral component of contemporary African culture.

Tillim, in his photography, resists focusing on the formalism of the architecture and instead considers its changing use of over the past half-century. He also resists viewing the buildings reductively as symbols of domination or as representative of the general decay of African institutions, but rather seeks to acknowledge the complexity of their histories.

Tillim embarked on this project as the recipient of the first Robert Gardner Fellowship in Photography granted by the Peabody Museum at Harvard University in the United States. In 2008 Tillim has solo exhibitions at Haunch of Venison in Zurich and Haus für Kunst in Altdorf, Switzerland, and is included on Biennale Cuvée at the OK Centre for Contemporary Art in Linz, Austria. He also takes part in the Hereford Photography Festival - Contemporary Photography from South Africa Part 2 - in the UK; and 'Presumed Innocence: Photographic Perspectives of Children' at DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Massachusetts, USA.

Opens: July 10
Closes: August 23

Douglas Gimberg, Christian Nerf and Barend de Wet team up at blank projects. Gimberg explains: 'I'm not sure what the occasion was but Christian, Barend and I were braaing wors at the studio. It's the woolies lamb sausage we were owed by Renee Holleman from "Carpentry 101". It seems fine despite having sat in the fridge at the AVA for a couple of weeks. Christian decides we should get a picture while the three of us are together, we try to set up the shot to look like the one taken by the suicidal guy on Blouberg beach before our escape. The order is wrong though, Barend is on the right, then me and finally Christian, who has to rush into shot before the timer goes off. I gaze "out to sea" while Barend watches the camera. Christian doesn't quite make it, he's still getting into character when the flash goes off. It's still better than the previous attempt though: the camera (resting on the top of the wall between our building and the next) had fallen over in the breeze.'

Opens: July 23
Closes: July 30

'Iso Eliphandliwe' is a photographic exhibition by Nomusa Makhubu. Makhubu explains: 'It will be comprised of images that disfigure the self-portrait while trying to re-place it to an identifiable axis. There is usage of old (South) African photography. My self-portrait becomes lost within images that have centred debates about the black female body within constructs of culture and socialisation.' Makhubu received the 2006 Gerard Sekoto Award for the year's most promising young artist. This award was initiated in collaboration with Absa, the French Embassy, the French Institute of South Africa (IFAS) and the Alliance Française.

Opens: July 5
Closes: August 29

Yvette Dunn curates Sibusiso Duma's first solo exhibition in Cape Town. 'The Story Teller' demonstrates Duma's standard methodology whereby he 'stores' his own life experiences, opinions and nostalgic stories of childhood in his paintings and thus makes sense of life today. The figures in his paintings reference illustration and the tradition of storytelling. Duma started drawing with crayons and coloured pencils as far back as he can remember. In 1994 he met the late Trevor Makhoba who was well known for his controversial and socially critical painting style. Makhoba mentored Duma from 1994 until his death in 2003 and much of this influence can be seen in Duma's earlier work.

Simultaneously Strijdom van der Merwe will be exhibiting 'Haikoes' a documentation of one of his land art projects. Forty five poets wrote 163 poems that negotiated water, wind, mountains, earth, ground and trees. Each poem was printed on a white cloth 1,5 x 1 metres and hung on six lines that criss-cross each other to make up an installation of approximately 200 square metres .The flags/poems are therefore read as prayer flags blowing in the wind, spreading messages across the landscape. Van der Merwe is an established land artist who creates sculptures in the landscape with natural materials and then documents these by means of photographs.

Randolph Hartzenberg presents a show entitled 'Prints' which features works from the Monotype Series Map of the Neighborhood. They form a collective statement, the imagery and iconography showing Hartzenberg's concerns with the 'inner neighbourhood' that has developed over the last 12 years. A selection of screenprints from his series titled Abbreviations will also be featured on this exhibition.

Opens: July 14
Closes: August 1

Norman O'Flynn shows 'The Butterfly Project' at blank projects. Explaining the theme with this enigmatic byline: '"When will I be a butterfly?" the caterpillar asked. "When you have finished being a caterpillar", the butterfly laughed.'

Alongside this, local artist Gabrielle Alberts is to launch her debut entitled 'Fine Art'. The show is an exhibition of found objects that deals with notions of the artist as collector and selector. It features a series of purchased amateur artworks to be displayed and sold together as one installation. Alberts explains the rationale of the show, as well as how she brought the works together: 'It's a solo show where I act more as curator than artist,' she says. 'These works would, according to art critics, connoisseurs and aficionados, be considered useless in terms of traditional definition. In collecting the pieces I ask why they fail (and here qualify) conceptually, stylistically and/or technically.'

Alberts, a graduate of the Michealis School of Fine Art, produces sculpture, video and assemblage works that currently deal with the notion of the artist as an individual in society. She considers her mode of production to be fundamentally conceptual, as opposed to formal or procedural.

Opens: July 2
Closes: July 18

Subtle, new, grey-hued paintings by Cape Town artist Kate Gottgens are on view at Rose Korber. They touch on the relationship between humans and animals. 'What is "human" and what is "animal"?' ponders the artist, 'What is the relationship between "us" and "them"', she asks, 'How do we look at them, and is there a liminal space in which we meet?'

'Looking at the alienation from nature and the animal world that has occurred over the last century,' adds Gottgens, 'we find ourselves longing for greater connection to and integration with it'.

'Taking as reference photographs - that are curio-like - of landscapes and wildlife or ethnographic subjects (like the photographs of Irving Penn), and seeking to "reach" through these references, to some newfound discovery: To perhaps "recover" these images, which is all we have, in a sense, as we have no real experience, but a removed, voyeuristic one, to rework and recover what we can only imagine to have lost.'

Opens: July 1
Closes: July 31

'Between Meaning and Matter' will be the Bell-Roberts' inaugural exhibition in their new premises in Woodstock. The exhibition will feature all new works from artists within the Bell-Roberts stable and certain invited artists. Focusing on current developments in South African art, and founded upon a commitment to transforming traditions, 'Between Meaning and Matter' brings together an exhibition of dynamic works which are grounded in the tension inherent in the relationship between meaning and matter.

'Between Meaning and Matter' includes a pixellated mural by 2008 Mercedes-Benz South Africa Art Award winner, Kevin Brand; a two-metre laser-cut tondo based on internet generational patterns by Lyndi Sales; and Lynette Bester's sculpture encapsulating hundreds of toys collected by the Hell's Angels. There are also new sharp-focus paintings by Nigel Mullins, paintings from movie-stills by Tanya Poole (joint winner 2004 Brett Kebble Art Award), and a community-based performance by 'alt-pop' artist Jacques Coetzer, recently completed on a residency in Scotland. Further participants are Johann van der Schijff (winner of two awards at Dak'art 2008), Berco Wilsenach (2005 Absa l'Atelier winner), Kudzanai Chiurai, Fahamu Pecou, Svea Josephy, Anthony Strack and Phillipe Bousquet.

Opens: June 25
Closes: August 8

Whatiftheworld / Gallery will be hosting a group exhibition titled 'Prints + Editions'. The show features a selection of works that are contextualised through the medium of prints and the concept of editions rather than a single unifying idea or 'theme'. Participating artists are encouraged to explore the idea of editions and multiples in new ways. For example, the creation of an eventual print object may be the result of a performance or installation, an indicator of a larger artistic experiment, or a unique object or project in its own right.

This show is also intended as an exploration of the idea of the edition, either as an extension of the print manifested in digital or sculptural form, or as a multiple. In short, the print or edition is an interesting object capable of exploring many different aspects of cultural production simultaneously.

Selected participating artists include Avant Car Guard, Doing it for Daddy, Julia Rosa Clark, Cameron Platter, Daniel Halter, Stuart Bird, The President, Rowan Smith, Georgina Gratrix, Lizza Littlewort, Robert Sloon and David West.

Opens: June 5
Closes: June 28

Louise Linder's new series of oil paintings, entitled 'From Here to Eternity', continues her interest in recovered anonymous family photographic archives. One of these sources is an album which chronicles events in the life of 'Iris' from childhood, through her frolics with girlfriends in her teenage years to large formal wedding photographs: snapshots of personal histories seemingly unconnected to the larger picture of History. The small-scale figures, primarily women and children, float in an atemporal space. A disquietude stems from the tension between an intense transient present, and the remembrance of things past adumbrating an uncertain world-to-be.

Opens: July 2
Closes: August 2

'Baring', curated by Eunice Geustyn, employs all four gallery spaces. It is an exploration of the human response to the self from the uncovered to the revealed, using the body as a metaphor. This diverse exploration of the engagement between the artist and the human body is examined in the context of the physical, the psychological, the spiritual and the metaphysical.

Participating artists include Sanell Aggenbach, Lynette Bester, Kevin Brand, Justin Brett, Karen Cronje, Heike Davis, Chris Diedericks, Carol-anne Gainer, Adam Letch, Marlise Keith, Paul Painting, Eris Silke, Pamela Stretton, Adrienne Van Eeden, Louis Van Vuuren and Judy Woodborne, amongst others.

Opens: June 23
Closes: July 11

'Abstract South African Art from the Isolation Years: Volume II' is the second in a series of exhibitions to focus exclusively on the generation of post-war avant-garde artists who consciously embraced the modernist idiom and produced art of an abstract or non-figurative nature during the 60s, 70s and 80s.

The history of abstract art in South Africa is diverse and complex, comprising various influences that cannot be reduced to a single linear and chronological narrative. The exhibition has therefore been curated in an inclusive manner to represent a unique body of work which highlights the different styles and exponents that made a significant contribution to the abstract movement in South Africa.

Some of the artists included in this year's collection are Lionel Abrahams, Bill Ainslie, Kenneth Bakker, Charl Buchner, Walter Battis, Bettie Cilliers-Barnard, Joan Claire, Christo Coetzee, Nel Erasmus, Barbara Burry, George Boys, Nils Burwitz, Charles Gassner, Cecil Higgs, Erik Loubscher, Dumisani Mabaso, Louis Maqhubela, Dirk Meerkotter, Georgina Ormiston, Douglas Portway, Fred Schimmel, Larry Scully, Cecily Sash, Henry Symonds, Gunter van Der Reis Edoardo Villa, Gordon Vorster and Anna Vorster. Also forming part of this exhibition is a unique collection of Ernest Mancoba's early paintings from Kattinge, Denmark.

Opens: June 19
Closes: August 29

Land artist Andy Goldsworthy has travelled to South Africa to oversee the installation of three of his pieces into the collection of the Swiss magnate Donald Hess, owner of Paarl winery Glen Carlou. Goldsworthy is a world famous environmental sculptor who explores and experiments with various natural materials such as leaves, stones, wood, sand, clay, ice and snow. The seasons and weather determine the materials and the subject matter of his projects. With no preconceived ideas of what he will create, he relies on what nature gives him. One piece Hard Earth was originally created by plastering the inside of a room with white clay which as it dried and cracked began to take on a vastly differently aspect. Hard Earth and other Goldsworthy pieces in the Hess collection will be going on show.

Alongside Goldsworthy, a key diasporan artist, Ouattara Watts, will also be showing work at Glen Carlou. Watts has been featured in a number of blockbuster shows including Okwui Enwenzor's 'The Short Century', 'Documenta' in 2000, the Whitney biennale and the Venice biennale. On display will be 11 of his paintings and watercolours from 1992 until 2006.

Opens: January 29