My hypothesis is that if you map the prevalence of the term “project space” in local artspeak onto a graph of South Africa’s economic growth, you will find a more or less inverse correlation. When the economy is down, emerging artists and curators tend to take matters into their own hands and set up small exhibition venues of their own. At least since the 2008 crash, the correlation has been pretty consistent. Youngblackman was the project space du jour during the so-called Great Recession, Jnr arguably defined the 2016 slump and Under Projects might be the stand out of the COVID recession crop (on which Sean O’Toole recently reported). These initiatives occupy an interesting in-between space in the art world. Not only do they fill the gap left behind when galleries hunker down and prioritise their big sellers, but they also straddle some of the intractable contradictions of the art market.
If, like most people, you find it hard to think beyond the demands of capital, you might wonder what the financial endgame of these short-lived projects could be. Or maybe you simply appreciate the value of a fleeting cultural moment at the margins of the art establishment. The artists and curators in charge of project spaces often need to take both of these considerations equally seriously. They usually aim to provide a more loose-limbed alternative to the gallery system by being strictly non-commercial, experimenting with far out ideas and practices, or even physically moving around. However, project spaces in South Africa ultimately find themselves on the same playing field with similar financial bottom lines as any local art business. In the long run, they either fold into the gallery system (as blank projects and WHATIFTHEWORLD chose to do) or go under (pun not intended). The public sector does not offer much in the way of widening the scope of possibilities here.
Belinda Blignaut, Stuart Bird and Linda Stupart, Vex and Siolence, 2010. Invitation for the exhibition at Youngblackman.
In 2011, Matthew Blackman published a pretty despondent eulogy to Youngblackman in ArtThrob, which detailed the manifold challenges involved in running a project space in South Africa. The piece, which reads like an unedited transmission from the depths of “post-project failure depression anxiety disorder,” cuts to the chase about South Africa’s “lack of interest” in contemporary art. Besides the problem of funding, Blackman goes so far as to say that South Africans, more so than other nations, fail to see the value of art beyond its monetary worth. Most of the issues he describes as “inherently South African” seem to be equally applicable to any developing economy, but the bile of his response is not unusual in the art world. While much of his diagnosis feels true, Blackman’s indignation is blunt and, at times, runs roughshod over the nuances that define the problem of arts funding.Here I am reminded of Susan Sontag’s lament in the opening paragraph of Against Interpretation: “From now to the end of consciousness, we are stuck with the task of defending art.” The value of an artwork is never self-explanatory; one always needs to make a case for it. It is worth foregrounding that the art world produces a very different value form to almost any other sector that is eligible for state funding. Squaring the needs of artists with the need for housing or public healthcare can seem ridiculous during times like these, which also affects the way artists make sense of the work they do. It should come as no surprise, then, that many artists in South Africa try to make work with an explicit socio-political use value. It is a way to defend the art they make, to make it fit within the treasury’s system of equivalences that flattens the arts into a tool. The reduction of everything to a commensurate utility means that artworks become means towards ends rather than ends in themselves.
Nonzuzo and Noncedo Gxekwa, Taxi Diaries, 2023. An exhibition at Constitution Hill (Joubert Street) supported by wherewithall.
It is possible to commodify artworks in this way, but a lot harder to sell the potential for art that lies dormant in an empty project space. Perhaps even more troubling than the lack of arts funding is the fact that those in charge of project spaces seldom even bother applying for government money, as Blackman himself admits. Partly because they are not likely to get any, but also because no one really knows where their project fits into the grander scheme of things. A notable exception worth considering at this point is wherewithall, another product of the COVID downturn. True to its name, wherewithall provides the means for artists and curators to produce shows outside of the “institutional model of exhibition making in Johannesburg.” The organisation has been chugging along since 2020 with the support of the National Arts Council, which has allowed them to show consistently interesting work. wherewithall remains an exception that proves the rule, but it shows that what is worth “defending” about project spaces is precisely the kind of space they provide.
The value of making space for art — that is, space for open-ended experimentation — appears, on the one hand, self-evident, but on the other, like a pretty hard sell. The trouble is that a space for open-ended experimentation will, of necessity, produce a lot of bad art. There is no guarantee that investing in a project space will yield anything good or interesting and that is precisely why you (yes you!) should invest in one. It is the very indeterminacy of such a space that gives it its unique value. The thankless work of making room for young artists to try things should be cherished precisely because it is such a foolish business prospect. For the sublime has always thrived in modest workshops like these. Not in the spotlight of institutional recognition, but in some basement, where art is more valuable than money. The great irony is that the art market relies on these underground spaces to produce the avant-garde, which becomes its most valuable commodity.
Underground spaces do not exist without the art market either. This is one of the intractable contradictions I alluded to earlier on. Big galleries and project spaces are two sides of the same coin, though it is not the capitalist relation that I am claiming to be intractable here. My claim is that the art world always holds within it the dialectical tension between recognition and obscurity, canon and counter-canon, centre and fringe. Project spaces are naïve for a very good reason. Their marginal presence acts as a foil for the art establishment and vice versa. One can acknowledge that relatively few people are in the position to take the financial risk of starting a project space and that taking such risks are the lifeblood of any art ecosystem. Bottom line: project spaces are a terrible investment and I encourage everybody to start one.
Nkhensani Mkhari, Counterpoint for Apophenia Part 1, 2022. Photo by Mikhailia Peterson. Courtesy of Lebo Kekana of FEDE Arthouse.
