RHODES MUST FALL EXHIBITION
“Echoing Voices from Within”
Rhodes Must Fall Movement (RMF) will be hosting a multifaceted exhibition entitled “Echoing Voices from Within” on 9 March 2016 at the CAS Gallery at 18h00. “Echoing Voices from Within”, captures with precision the multi-layered and intersectional voice of black bodies – the students, workers and staff who have come together with the aim of subverting white supremacy, institutionalized patriarchy and racism at the University of Cape Town (UCT), other institutions of higher learning and broader society, thus highlighting the salient issues around race, class and gender.
It speaks into the psyche of an unfolding political milieu, where voices, bodies and action coalesce to form a global movement that is breaking down the psychological walls of colonial reasoning.
An undercurrent of pain and anger amongst the black student body was catalyzed and brought to the surface by Chumani Maxwele’s radical performative intervention with the statue of Cecil John Rhodes on Monday the 9th of March 2015. What began with throwing of poo on the Rhodes statue gave “birth” to student movements in South Africa and across the world: Rhodes Must Fall Oxford (UK), Decolonize Wits, Decolonize Law (UCT), Open Stellenbosch (Stellenbosch), Black Students Movement (Rhodes University), George Must Fall (UKZN), Fees Must Fall and many others, who hare in aspects of the Philosophy of ‘Fallism’ that is rooted in the decolonial project.
Included in the exhibition are archival photographs that capture important moments in the movement’s history, as well as banners, audio-visual material and other related objects forming a palimpsest. The signifiers of this ongoing political intervention recall the political zeitgeist of the student uprising of 1976 across the length and breath of South Africa. Speaking to our collective consciousness and the continuity of grief carried through the physical and psychological wounds of the black child, the exhibition attempts to echo and reflect upon the often untold stories of black pain and the collective agony of peoples whose plight can no longer be ignored.
Included in the exhibition is a wall curated by CAS called ‘Contested Legacies’ where Rhodes, Jameson and other uncomfortable symbols and their presences are contextualised and interrogated.
During the exhibition there will also be walkabouts, seminars and other activities related to the exhibition and the Rhodes Must Fall moment. Please see Rhodes Must Fall Facebook page for events surrounding the exhibition.
In the build up to the opening the programme will begin with a revisit of significant sites where #RhodesMustFall events happened on UCT campus. It will begin at “Bremner Building” also known as Azania One at 3pm and move to Upper Campus. There will be performances along the route.
For more information contact:
Wandile Kasibe, Rhodes Must Fall Movement Curator – gwandile@gmail.com or rhodesmustfall@gmail.com (Mobile: 072 8708966)
Pam Dhlamini, Rhodes Must Fall Curator – pamdhlamini8@gmail.com or rhodesmustfall@gmail.com (Mobile: 078 0167528)
Paul Weinberg, Curator of the CAS Gallery – paul.weinberg@uct.ac.za
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