From Mary Sibande to Igshaan Adams, Southern African artists have brought a distinctly local mind-set to Sweden’s Wanås sculpture park, writes Steuart Wright.
Every year, barn swallows follow an endless summer by traversing the globe between South Africa and Sweden. This year the work of six South African-based artists has followed in their path for an exhibition entitled Barriers at Sweden’s Wanås sculpture park.
One hundred kilometres northeast of Malmö, the Wanås estate is a prominent feature in the rural landscape of Östra Göinge. It incorporates a 16th-century castle, an organic farm, an art gallery and a world-famous sculpture park that is home to more than 50 permanent outdoor artworks. Louise Bourgeois, Janet Cardiff, Ann Hamilton, Yoko Ono and Robert Wilson are among the 250 or so artists to exhibit here since Wanås Konst’s inception in 1987.
About 60 000 visitors will thread through the gallery and park this year, stumbling on subtle artistic gestures, bold architectural statements and intriguing sound installations set in disused farm buildings, cultivated gardens and an expansive natural beech woodland that includes dams, waterways and a 500-year-old oak where Danish guerillas were hanged in a 17th-century battle with the Swedes.
The works of Igshaan Adams, Kudzanai Chiurai, Hannelie Coetzee, Nandipha Mntambo, Mary Sibande and James Webb will feature among them in the Wanås Konst art foundation’s 2015 main exhibition that runs until November.
Mary Sibande’s Let Slip the Dogs of War was fêted at the Barriers opening. [see image above]
In Barriers, South Africa holds these artists in common, but it is the overarching motivation of Wanås Konst founder Marika Wachtmeister and the curatorial team of Elisabeth Millqvist and Mattias Givell that pins them together in Sweden’s ongoing fascination with global dialogue and cultural exchange.
Kudzanai Chiurai’s Moyo
Hannelie Coetzee’s Ou Sog tussen Bome blends into the forest.
Millqvist explains: “South Africa is the starting point for this exhibition because it has a vibrant art scene. There you can be educated at art schools, you can exhibit at galleries and be part of a market. South Africa is a country where a lot is happening, there are a lot of stimuli.”
For full report by Steuart Wright see Mail & Guardian
PHOTO CREDIT: Mattias Givell and Devin Toselli
