Art South Africa

NEWS: Call for Writing and Visuals for ITCH e.02

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0200

By Hein Bekker.

Art South Africa's sister publication ITCH is calling for submissions for its next issue, themed " * " (asterisk). Visit itch.co.za for more.

ITCH is a South African born, internationally relevant periodical featuring established and rising literary and visual talent.

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NEWS: ITCH online edition now open

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0200

By Hein Bekker.

Our sister publication ITCH has a new web site and is calling for submissions for its next issue. ITCH is a South African born, internationally relevant periodical featuring established and rising literary and visual talent.

Please visit itch.co.za for more.

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NEW ISSUE: Art South Africa v6.4

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0200

Features

The Order of Things
On a cloudy Thursday evening in March, the Joburg Art Fair became an actuality. After months of relentless promotion, clinched in the last few weeks by a billboard campaign featuring the event's distinctive strips of horizontal colour, it was time for Foucault to make way for Fendi. Over the next three days, participating galleries, some foreign, most of them local, chalked up a whopping R25 million in sales.

Half Like a Joke
It's a familiar routine: crap show by crap artist in crap gallery serving crap wine. Robert Sloon pulls up his jeans and braves another dubious Wednesday night opening in Cape Town "Um," I say. I'm wearing my glasses so it passes off as something intelligent anyway. I'm chatting to the gallerist at an exhibition opening in the centre of town, Cape Town that is, and I'm riffing on the centres of art power moving to Woodstock – how art is the vanguard of an insipid gentrification, inner city living, that leaves the poor worse off. The gallerist starts looking around to see who else has arrived. Maybe she's also started contemplating the cheap rent out there....to read more see v6.4

From Here to There
Five senior South African artists were recently asked by an Italian curator to each propose a list of young artists for a show in Siena, Italy. Amy Halliday attended the resulting show and reports on some of the discussions it elicited

Bright Young Things
Art South Africa's fifth and sixth Bright Young Things for 2008, Andrzej Nowicki and Jonah Sack

Exhibition Reviews

Edoardo Villa
Nirox Sculpture Park, Johannesburg, 10 March - 4 May 2008

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NEWS: Call for Photographic Submissions for snapped 02

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0200

By Hein Bekker.

Art South Africa's sister publication snapped is calling for submissions for its next issue on Affluence. The deadline is 15 May 2008. Visit snapped.co.za for more.

snapped is an important quarterly magazine showcasing thoughtfully selected photography from the African continent. Each themed issue includes news essays, portfolios, an in-depth interview, profiles, listings and technology reviews.

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NEWS: Art South Africa Magazine at the Joburg Art Fair

Thu, 13 Mar 2008 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

Visit us at the Joburg Art Fair at the Speciality books section from 13 March to the 16th at the Sandton Convention Centre.

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NEWS: Art South Africa Magazine at Design Indaba Expo

Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

Visit us on Stands G8 and G9 at Design Indaba from the 23rd to 26th February 2008. Volume 6.3 of Art South Africa will be available for sale from the stand. Also take the opportunity to have a first look at our sister publication snapped, a quarterly on African photography what will be launching at the Indaba.

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NEWS: Taking Stock: Seven men speak out

Sat, 01 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Sean O'Toole.

"In spite of the enactment of domestic violence legislation in 1993 and the initiation of innumerable programmes aimed at counselling, educating and supporting abused women and children, domestic violence is rife in South Africa," states artist Jacki McInnes. Recognising the crucial silence of men on this pressing subject, McInnes decided to curate a show documenting exclusively male viewpoints. "I had the idea a year ago, while grappling
artistically with this topic myself, that it could be an interesting exercise to delve into the artistic psyches of ... male artists and see just what interpretations come out." Titled A Legacy of Men, the show includes contributions by Pierre Fouché, Robert Hamblin, Nicholas Hlobo, Lawrence Lemoana, Mikhael Subotzky, Johan Thom and Kemang Wa-Lehulere. The exhibition proposes "a secure forum where it is hoped that visual cues will trigger responses on matters often suppressed". A Legacy of Men is on at the Johannesburg Art Gallery until February 24, 2008.

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NEWS: The Human Touch: Marlene Dumas in South Africa

Sat, 01 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Sean O'Toole.

Marlene Dumas, the South African- born Dutch painter who completed her undergraduate studies at Michaelis before relocating abroad in 1976, is currently presenting her first-ever solo exhibition locally. Titled Intimate Relations, the exhibition opened at Cape Town's Iziko
South African National Gallery in November and runs until January 13, 2008. Jointly curated by the artist and Emma Bedford, of Goodman Gallery Cape, the show includes a number of sexually explicit images. "Dumas has long been interested in the relationship of pornography to erotica and in notions of exposure and concealment," writes Bedford in an essay appearing in a 140-page book released to coincide with the exhibition. Titled Marlene Dumas: Intimate Relations, the book was jointly edited by Bedford and Dumas, and is co-published by Jacana Media, Johannesburg and Roma Publishers, Amsterdam. Dumas, whose reputation as a painter has in recent times been burdened by her upbeat performance
at auction, strongly divides opinion. In a 1994 review published in Art in America her handling of paint was praised as "direct, notational and extremely deft, as though
Dumas were recording her dreams in their raw immediacy". Village Voice art critic Jerry Salz is less impressed; earlier this year he described Dumas as a "second- rate latter-day Neo-Expressionist". Intimate Relations, which moves to Johannesburg's Standard Bank Gallery in 2008 (February 6 – March 29), does not include The Teacher (Sub a), a large (1.6 x 2m) painting that fetched $3.34m at a 2005 London auction.

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NEWS: Celebrate with us tomorrow

Thu, 30 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

Art South Africa turns 5 years old this Friday (August 31) with the release of volume 6.1. Join us to celebrate this milestone at Bell-Roberts, 89 Bree Street, Cape Town between 5pm and 8:30pm. All welcome

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NEWS: Our boy wonder: Subotzky & Magnum

Thu, 30 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

Photographer Mikhael Subotzky is one of three photographers to have been invited to join Magnum, arguably the world's most famous photo agency. A cooperative agency with offices in London, Paris, Tokyo and New York, Magnum was founded in 1947 by Henri Cartier Bresson and Robert Capa, amongst others. The invitation was announced following a meeting held on June 21, in the gardens of the Museum of Modern Art in New York – the same venue the original founders of Magnum decided to create the agency 60 years ago. Subotzky, whose new exhibition of photographs is on display at Goodman Gallery Cape until September 15, was invited to become a Nominee Member, "a category of membership which presents an opportunity for Magnum and the individual to get to know each other, but where there are no binding commitments on either side". After a period of two years, he can present another portfolio in support of an Associate Membership. If successful, he will then become a fully-fledged member of the agency. This year's other two nominees are Argentinean Allessandra Sanguinetti and Dane Jacob Aue Sobol. "I couldn't be happier with the excellence and diversity of this group," remarked Alec Soth, an influential Minneapolis-based photographer on his popular internet blog.

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NEWS: Handshakes & Envelopes: Lots of winners

Thu, 30 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Sean O'Toole.

It has been a busy mid-year for awards and competitions. Pierre Fouche, featured in the last issue of this magazine (ASA 5:4), won the Absa L'Atelier Award. The Cape Town-based artist netted R100,000 plus a return ticket to the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris for his work in progress embroidery. Nina Barnett, who entered a charming stop-frame animation, won the Gerard Sekoto Award, a special category award within the Absa L'Atelier aimed at promising young artists with an annual income of less than R60,000.

Paul Edmunds, a previous winner of the L'Atelier (in 1992, when it was known as the Volkskas Atelier), has been awarded the 2007 Tollman Award for the Visual Arts. The award, judged by Gabi Ngcobo, Rochelle Keene, Walter Oltmann and Michael Stevenson, rewards a young South African artist of exceptional ability and includes R100,000 prize money.
Adman turned dealer, Gavin Rooke won top honours in the 18th annual Sasol New Signatures Competition. He received the award for a photograph of Berea, an inner city suburb of Johannesburg. The photograph was shot on expired transparency film dating from 1979. "It was a big surprise indeed," said Rooke, who took home a cheque for R60,000. Rooke recently opened his eponymous gallery in Newtown with an exhibition of band photographs by photographer Liam Lynch.

Alexandra Ross, currently completing her Masters in Fine Art at Wits University, won the Brait-Everard Read Art Award 2007. It was the first time in the award's three-year history that the judging panel selected just one winner, without a merit award winner or special condition of sharing the prize. Well known as a painter, Ross's winning work comprised seven large-scale colour digital photographs. Also in Johannesburg, Cathy Dickerson, Gabrielle Goliath and Surprise Khoza were jointly awarded Wits University's Martienssen Prize.
In awards of a different nature, ReVisions, the luxurious hardcover book documenting collector Bruce Campbell Smith's idiosyncratic collection of paintings, prints and sculptures, won the best book award at the SA Museums Association 2007 conference in Maropeng. The book is edited by curator Hayden Proud. The Sunday Times, whose centenary celebrations have included the commissioning of site-specific public artworks, received a Business & Arts South Africa award for Best Use of New Commissioned Art. The Sunday Times project, which kicked off with works installed in and around Johannesburg, was managed by arts consultancy AAW Art Project Management.

Paul Emsley, who taught drawing and painting at the University of Stellenbosch from 1983 to 1995, won the BP Portrait Award. He received the £25,000 first prize for an atmospheric portrait of Michael Simpson. Emsley has lived in England since leaving South Africa in 1996.

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NEWS: WC Grande Provence opens Sculpture Garden

Thu, 16 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

The 5-star Grande Provence Estate in Franschhoek, home of numerous award winning wines, is establishing itself as a commercial centre for South African sculpture and will open the first ever 'Sculpture Garden' on a wine estate in the country, on Sunday 2 September 2007. 'The Gallery' on the Estate has already become synonymous as a leading location for South African visual arts through regular exhibitions featuring many leading and indeed emerging South African artists.

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NEWS: Members only

Wed, 23 May 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Stacy Hardy.

"Who cares about a video being dropped out of the Ponte, or a white man being circumcised?" It sounds like a typical South African art world whinge until you realise that the artist doing the whinging is partly targeting his own work. The quote is from Peet Pienaar, performance artist turned designer. His shift from self-endangering, body-exposing conceptual work to commercial design is one of the stranger trajectories in South African art. It's a journey from the personal to the public, from transgression to inclusion, improvisation to big budget, art world notoriety to global acclaim. ilike.co.za

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NEWS: Malick Sidibé to be honoured at Venice Biennale

Tue, 22 May 2007 00:00:00 +0200

By Tau Tavengwa.

Malian photographer Malick Sidibé is to be awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement of the 52nd International Art Exhibition during a brief ceremony at the Giardini della Biennale.

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NEWS: Chat

Sun, 20 May 2007 00:00:00 +0200

… is promoting conversation

By Kim Gurney.

A conversation about the plight of artists in the Western Cape was the trigger for the establishment of a new organisation called The Community Arts and Health Trust (CHAT), officially launched at the Brooklyn Chest Hospital in March. CHAT aims to engage artists, patients and business in mutually beneficial exchange. Visual artists are already involved in the pilot project at Brooklyn under the auspices of CitySkin. This collective of like-minded artists headed up by Kevin McCauley grew out of Multimediations, the art awareness programme run by Cape Africa Platform as part of CAPE 07.

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NEWS: In-Terroir View

Sun, 20 May 2007 00:00:00 +0200

Galleries in the vineyards

By Tau Tavengwa.

Bell-Roberts Contemporary in April launched a new gallery in Somerset West on the Lourensford wine estate, owned by businessman Dr Christo Wiese. The space opened with a group exhibition entitled Portrait or Landscape. The link-up is the latest in a trend of galleries launching in the Cape winelands. These include the Gallery at Grande Provence in Franschhoek, Glen Carlou in Paarl (which hosts the Hess Art Collection) and the less fortunate Sante Winelands Hotel and Wellness Centre in the Paarl-Franschhoek valley. It was owned by financial services and technology company Fidentia, now under curatorship.

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