Investec Cape Town Art Fair
17.02 - 19.02.2023
In anticipation of Investec Cape Town Art Fair’s 10th anniversary edition, we chatted to the curators of Tomorrows/Today, a section highlighting solo work by emerging artists, Natasha Becker and Mariella Franzoni.
Firstly, can you tell our readers a little bit about your background as curators?
NATASHA BECKER: I have a strong foundation in African history, philosophy, global art history, and contemporary exhibition histories because, before I decided to pursue curating as a profession, I was on an academic journey. But I had several transformative experiences along the path to becoming a curator. For instance, when I was a graduate student in history at the University of the Western Cape, I had the privilege of working with Andrew Putter, an amazing local artist, arts educator, and activist, from Cape Town, as his research assistant for a project that examined the cultural histories of the Cape Town harbour. It was organised by Kunstinstituut Mellie (then called Witte de With) a Dutch organisation, and it was spread across Cape Town and Rotterdam. Like a good researcher, I delved deep into the archives and history of the harbour producing copious amounts of information, maps, and connections for the project. The artist digested all this information; he was particularly fascinated by the liminal spaces (transitions between spaces or states of being) of the Cape Town harbour. We interviewed and talked to different sailors and tattoo artists who shared their stories and adventures. In the end, he created a breathtaking public art installation using the language and symbolism of tattoos that the sailors shared with us, to tell their stories instead of the narrative created by the official documentation. I was just awestruck by the different ways we approached the project; myself as a historian and he as the artist. I was already interested in the visual, having studied with Patricia Hayes at UWC, but working with a living artist and experiencing first hand the potential of art to unearth and recontextualise stories of the past was mind-blowing.
I went to study art history in the United States, and along the way, I had another profound experience of working closely with an artist to organise a major international video art festival in a small town in Massachusetts (which included the work of Dineo Seshee Bopape, who was still in graduate school at Columbia University at the time). That project was much bigger, far more complex, and challenging than I ever imagined but we pulled it off and the response from local people was so overwhelmingly positive, that’s when I really knew this is what I wanted to do.
For me, curating is essentially about working collaboratively with artists, exhibition designers, installers, educators, and so on, to create new contexts for how people experience art and ideas that speak to the issues of the day.
Since then, I’ve worked in both South Africa, and North America, for over a decade organising numerous exhibitions and international initiatives. I’m most interested in contextualising the work of women and artists of African descent.
Professionally, I worked at the Clark Institute for seven years as the Assistant Director for Mellon Initiatives overseeing three year research initiatives on contemporary African art and, more recently, as an independent curator organising exhibitions at not for profit organisations, commercial galleries, and foundations. I also contribute to artist and curatorial talks, and exhibition catalogues. I’ve served as a curatorial adviser at the Face Foundation, a curator in residence at Faction Art Projects in Harlem, and senior curator at the Goodman Gallery in South Africa as well as contributing to artist and curator talks, and publications. In 2003, I co-founded Assembly Room with two international curators, to support independent curators and emerging artists living and working in New York City.
After all these rich experiences, I took on the exciting challenge of caring for a permanent collection of historical African art and proposing new exhibitions at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco in 2020.
MARIELLA FRANZONI: Just like Natasha, my journey toward curating started in the academic world. As a researcher and a scholar in the fields of art theory and critical studies, with a background in cultural anthropology, global art history and art & cultural management, I have always liked to link my work as an academic with a more pragmatic engagement with art and artists, as well as with other agents, including galleries and collectors. So, in my case, at the very beginning, I have approached curatorship as a theorist. I was interested in the dynamics behind curatorial practice and thinking, the way curatorial narratives are shaped, how curators can influence an artist’s success and the art market, and so on. This interest later became the subject of my PhD dissertation, which looks at the political economy of curating while engaging with the post-apartheid South African art context and the rise of contemporary art from Africa and the Diaspora in a progressively globalised art world. It was precisely during my doctoral research that I ended up moving to South Africa, where I spent almost 3 beautiful years as a fellow researcher at the UWC’s Center of Humanities Research, while deepening my knowledge of and interest in the Southern Africa art scene.
It was at the very beginning of my PhD journey that I started to curate exhibitions in art galleries, festivals or independent spaces. I quickly learned that curating is also made of an invisible practice, like mentoring artists, connecting people with art and artists, translating and unpacking art for art lovers and collectors. This curatorial caregiving that nourishes our sector is a sort of “unproductive labour.” It happens not only in the backstage of museums, but also inside galleries, in the studios, etc… More recently, my curatorial projects were very much involved with my art advisory practice as I would curate private-sale-exhibitions, in which I would bring together old masters and emerging artists. I have always intended curatorial work as a way to create unexpected links between the familiar and the non-familiar, or across time, between the past and the future, crafting new narratives and bridging artists, places and audiences in unconventional ways. I am also particularly interested in the dynamics that curators activate within market-oriented context like an art fair or an auction house: curatorial agency is particularly powerful when performed in the marketplace of art and this is one of the reasons I am excited about co-curating, with Natasha, Tomorrows/Today at the ICTAF.
There are ten artists exhibiting in Tomorrows/Today. Can you tell us who they are and what attracted you to their work?
MF: I have to say that it was not an easy selection process, as we received many good spontaneous applications. Natasha and I were truly aligned throughout all the process and have included only 10 artists that we were equally enthusiastic about.
The Tomorrows/Today 2023 artists are Cassi Namoda (Goodman Gallery, South Africa & UK), Micha Serraf (C24 Gallery, ISA), Carla Hayes Mayoral (Reiners Contemporary, Spain), Talia Ramikilawan (Bkhz Gallery, South Africa), Githan Coopoo (Everard Read Gallery, South Africa and UK), Deborah Segun (Bode Projects, Germany), Shamilla Aasha (First Floor Gallery, Harare), Gino Rubert (Galeria Senda, Spain), Rosie Mudge (Smac Gallery, South Africa), Joana Choumali (1957 Gallery, Ghana). It is undoubtedly a wonderful pull of talents, coming from very different cultural settings and geographies. We were attracted by each of them for very specific reasons related to their visual practices, conceptual researches or the way they approach art making. Plus, as you know the Tomorrows/Today program is a sort of “curated observatory” that puts in the spotlight promising emerging artists making their way into the international art world or overlooked talents that deserve to be more represented by the institutions, the market and the critique. Therefore, each one of the selected artists is at a very specific moment in their career: some of these artists have recently completed their masters and are entering the art world with an incredible strength, others have been practising locally in their country of origin and were not exposed to the international attention they deserve. With their participation in this program, we hope and trust that new good and deserved opportunities will come in their way.
You have expressed that issues of time, temporality and history are informing your curatorial scope for Tomorrows/Today. Can you tell us how these artists relate to the theme, “In And Out of Time”?
MF: “In and out of time” is our response to the theme of “Time” of the ICTAF 2023, as we have reimagined time and its multiple dimensions, including the experience of memory and history, in relation to the sphere of emotions, affection and love. These curatorial motives have guided us in selecting and bringing these 10 artists together, as they all differently engage with the proposed themes in their ongoing practice or in specific projects. For instance, Gino Rubert’s timeless paintings explore the sentimental world and the complexity of romantic relationships as a constant tension between love and death; on the other hand, the installations and textile works of Carla Hayes are filled with both historical references and her own inherited diasporic nostalgia of an unknown African homeland; Githan Coopoo’s clutch handbags-shaped ceramics speak about fragility and emotions in a very humorous and glamorous visual language, and so on. It will be a constellation of very different voices, beautiful artworks and meaningful artistic practices.
Curating for an art fair is not a simple task! There is so much activity, and so many booths competing for attention. Is there a thought or a feeling you wish to inspire in viewers when they visit Tomorrows/Today?
NB: Indeed. Yes, I hope the section inspires a feeling of sympatico, of compassion and a sense of discovery, of awe and wonder in visitors. I also hope that visitors are excited and able to meet and talk to some of the artists and learn more about their work.
Apart from your section, what are you looking forward to at this year’s fair?
MF: I know the 2023 edition is going to be a great one, an edition full of surprises for the 10th anniversary of the fair. The South African art scene will be present, while many people from all parts of the continent and beyond will be there, a mix of old friends and people that will be great to meet for the first time. This time, I will feel both a guest and a host at the fair, which is quite exciting. I am very interested in seeing how the fair has grown over the past years, as I haven’t been there since 2017. Of course, I have been following their work from afar, and the fair team is doing an amazing job (they have a solid selection criteria, are able to bring to Cape Town galleries from every corner of the world, promote the local scene, offer an excellent professional and VIP program, get the fair to be known worldwide). Moreover, I have to say that my return to South Africa and ICTAF comes with many emotions. It feels like I am returning home after a long time, and in fact this has been my home for several years before the pandemic. I can’t wait.
NB: Because of the pandemic, it’s been at least 3 years since I was home. I can’t wait to see my family, enjoy February in Cape Town, and reconnect with friends, artists, and colleagues.