Current Review(s)
'Life Less Ordinary' at Djanogly Gallery, Nottingham
Athi-Patra Ruga, Berni Searle, Pieter Hugo, Zanele Muholi and Nandipha Mntambo at Djanogly Art GalleryWhile thematic constructs such as ‘identity’ and ‘performance’ are familiar paradigms within the South African art circuit, often even fatigued, the rise of racialised nationalism in the UK and Europe (witness the 'immigration' policies of the British National Party and Italy's Lega Nord) gives the Djanogly Art Gallery’s latest exhibition, 'A Life Less Ordinary', a politically incisive edge.
Curator Anna Douglas takes her conceptual cue from a seminal essay by Ash Amin on today’s charged politics of difference. Aptly titled 'The Racialisation of Everything', Amin’s essay explores how racial categorisation is founded on ‘fictions of difference made to count as the irreconcilables of essence, sometimes justified on grounds of biological difference, sometimes on grounds of so-called cultural incompatibility’. With its focus on contemporary South African art, the exhibition explores personal fictions set in dialogue with some of identity’s grandest narratives. The resultant conversations are at turns satirical and subversive, interrogative and whimsical.
05 September 2009 - 15 November 2009
Listings(s)
'Longing for Sea-Change'
Berni Searle at Cantor Arts CenterCantor Arts Center at Stanford University presents ‘Longing for Sea-Change’, a series of video works by contemporary artists living and working in Africa and its diasporas.
The video installations are on continuous view in the Center’s expanded gallery for African art.
Each video in the ‘Longing for Sea-Change’ series of installations contemplates the impact that memory, migration, and exile have had on the human landscape — both within and away from the African continent.
Works on show include Spirit of ’76 and Seeking Refuge made by Berni Searle in 2007 and 2008 respectively.
07 October 2009 - 26 June 2010
'Life Less Ordinary' at Djanogly Gallery, Nottingham
Athi-Patra Ruga, Berni Searle, Pieter Hugo, Zanele Muholi and Nandipha Mntambo at Djanogly Art Gallery'Life Less Ordinary' considers fictions of categorization and difference - be it the idea of race, nationhood, ethnicity, sexuality, religion or belonging -explored by a range of contemporary artists from South Africa.
This exhibition brings together works of photography, performance, film and installation by a younger generation wishing to shake loose from the epic narrative of race to play with, stage, transcend, celebrate and deconstruct more complex and nuanced subjectivities.
Artists include Pieter Hugo, Zanele Muholi, Nandipha Mntambo, Steven Cohen, Dineo Bopape, Berni Searle and Andrew Putter.
05 September 2009 - 15 November 2009
‘Rebelle. Art and Feminism 1969-2009’
Berni Searle at MMKA, ArnhemFrom poster activists to virtual cyber art, forty years of art history are on display in ‘Rebelle’. This exhibition focuses on works by female artists who are or have been greatly inspired by feminism. While the topic of art and feminism has both champions and opponents, everyone is in agreement about one thing: feminism permanently changed the artistic landscape.
‘Rebelle’ brings together work from different generations and parts of the world. Berni Searle (1964) who often uses natural pigments and changes the color of her skin with them – recalling the spice trade and colonization – is, for example, influenced by Cuban American Ana Mendieta’s (1948-1985) “earth prints.” The Guatemalan Regina Galindo (1974) belongs to a generation of performance artists that use their bodies to question chaos and violence in their societies. Her work recalls that of Gina Pane. Works by Zanele Muholi and Dineo Bopape will also be exhibited.
Newspaper clippings, documentaries and photos add another layer to ‘Rebelle’. The art is placed in the context of important social developments, the changing position of women, and ‘action’ and intervention in the art world in particular.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue.
30 May 2009 - 23 August 2009
Life Less Ordinary: Performance and Display in South African Art'
Athi-Patra Ruga, Berni Searle, Brett Bailey, Zanele Muholi, Araminta de Clermont and Nandipha Mntambo at FfotogalleryFfotogallery, the national development agency for photography and lens-based media in Wales, presents ‘Life Less Ordinary’; a major exhibition held at two sites, featuring timely work by a selection of artists working and living in South Africa today.
'Life Less Ordinary' brings together photography, performance, video and installation work by a young generation of South African artists wishing to break away from epic narratives of race and instead play with, celebrate, stage and transcend more complex notions of difference and identity.
The exhibition features a range of work by artists Tracey Rose, Nandipha Mntambo, Zanele Muholi, Brett Murray, Pieter Hugo, Dineo Bopape, Brett Bailey, Athi-Patra Ruga, Steven Cohen, Araminta de Clermont and Berni Searle, including work selected for Artes Mundi 1 and acquired by the Museum of Wales for the national collection.
‘Life Less Ordinary’ has been curated by Anna Douglas and is a touring exhibition from the Djanogly Art Gallery, Lakeside Arts Centre at the University of Nottingham.
07 May 2010 - 19 June 2010
'Events of the Self: Portraiture and Social Identity'
Jo Ractliffe, Guy Tillim, Kay Hassan, Berni Searle, David Goldblatt, Santu Mofokeng, Hentie van der Merwe, Pieter Hugo, Zanele Muholi, Candice Breitz, Zwelethu Mthethwa and Nontsikelelo Veleko at The Walther CollectionThe Walther Collection opens to the public on June 17, 2010 with 'Events of the Self: Portraiture and Social Identity', introducing works from its African collection. Under the curatorial direction of Okwui Enwezor, the exhibition comprises a series of four projects filling all nine galleries in the three buildings of the new exhibition space in Burlafingen near Ulm, Southern Germany. The exhibition integrates the work of three generations of African artists and photographers with that of modern and contemporary German photography. This combination of African and German works will serve as a model for the kind of curatorial process that animates the character of the collecting program.
Works in the collection include those by Berni Searle, Candice Brietz, Nontsikelelo Veleko, Zanele Muholi, Hentie van der Merwe, David Goldblatt, Kay Hassan, Pieter Hugo, Guy Tillim, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Santu Mofokeng and Jo Ractliffe.
17 June 2010 - 17 October 2010
'Pictures by Women: A History of Modern Photography'
Berni Searle at MoMAFor much of photography’s 170-year history, women have expanded its roles by experimenting with every aspect of the medium. 'Pictures by Women: A History of Modern Photography' presents a selection of outstanding photographs by women artists, charting the medium’s history from the dawn of the modern period to the present. Including over two hundred works, this exhibition features celebrated masterworks and new acquisitions from the MoMA collection by such figures as Diane Arbus, Berenice Abbott, Claude Cahun, Imogen Cunningham, Rineke Dijkstra, Florence Henri, Roni Horn, Nan Goldin, Helen Levitt, Lisette Model, Lucia Moholy, Tina Modotti, Cindy Sherman, Kiki Smith, Carrie Mae Weems and Berni Searle.
07 May 2010 - 21 March 2011
