Danny Shorkend reviews In Context: Where We Are – a group exhibition – at the Goodman Gallery.
Ranging from a minimalist to an expressionistic aesthetic; inclusive of video, painting, drawing, collage, installation and photography, this exhibition forefronts considerations of Africa, in terms of the sense of place, memory and politics embroiled as it is in terms of ideology, religion, history and other extra-aesthetic dimensions.
The exhibition partners with Goodman Johannesburg’s focus on Africans in America, yet in contrast this exhibition is the work of African artists within Africa.
A gun shot…static…piercing sounds ringing endlessly. Gabrielle Goliath’s sound installation reflects on the high femicide rate in South Africa – in fact it’s the highest anywhere in the world. These are deafening sounds and a mat with the inscription that such sounds could be harmful – both physically and psychologically – is the only visual element in an otherwise auditory experience for one cannot see when violence and depravity is the order of the day. Where are we? We are here in a country that often does not have a high regard for the sanctity of life.
One could focus on the fact that the colonial past in South Africa (and elsewhere) have left scars on its territories – on individuals and groups – geographical, educational and indeed, culturally. And that as the pieces are being picked up as it were, there is a post colonial mentality that itself has not necessarily remedied the ills of society and the chasm between people, be it economic or other disparities and divisiveness.
What is perhaps needed is not simply a castigating of so-called Eurocentric knowledge in favour of anything African or plundering the past only in order to erect a new power and social order, but a discovery of what is common between people, how we all share in each others grief and as the wheel of life would have it, have experienced both victory and defeat, poverty and excess.
In light of the above, I would interpret David Koloane’s work as full of the potential for positive experiences within the cityscape, even here in South Africa. That his buzzing, busy “landscapes” are an effort to defy entropy and resignation. That indeed the artist is able to suggest that both the individual and the individual in relation to his/her environment can assert a strength and connectivity that perhaps may repel potential violence. One can only but hope.
Then, in contrast to the expressive painterly style of Koloane is Jeremy Wafer’s minimalist aluminium and vinyl leaning “sculptures” recalling the work of the earlier (European) forebears such as Don Flavin and John Ferren. Concerning such origins perhaps makes the point that aesthetic tradition need not deter one from simultaneously asserting affinity with other traditions, of a kind of playful post modern “borrowing”. There is no “pure” African or “pure” European”. Simple binaries simply set up antagonisms and potentially extreme exclusivity. Identity can still be established and a particular sense of belonging maintained amidst diversity, while recognising the fact that there is a vision that might encompass all humans. Yet this vision itself has no name nor is it monopolised in terms of a particular aesthetic or set of ideals. It is available to all, neither owned nor can it dissipate.
We need only recognise or sense – though this is inaccurate as it is also beyond sense – the sanctity of life. That is why Roulette, the sound installation mentioned at the outset is so worrying both here in South Africa and globally.
Perhaps there is a resolution: Chiurai’s photographs; Gunn-Salie’s sculptures and Henda’s Boxes (actual wooden crates) all seem to point to alternative ways of thinking. That accepted visual systems of for example a Messiah figure can come in many forms; that one needs to come to terms with painful history (for example colonial subjugation) and finally that art itself offers conceptual thinking that encompasses the everyday: a flight of the mind; even metaphysical thinking can happen at just about anytime, anywhere with a range of materials.
Where are we? Who is “we”? “Where” is open-ended as one is where ones thoughts are more or less. “In context” – the context shifts and changes so that this too is rendered unclear. In this sense the thread that links such multilayered and varied aesthetics and methods and the ideas “therein” do not easily match. Anger at the past, anger at the present or perhaps a subversion of the past as now ”we” are free to reflect and hopefully move forwards into a future that we would want for the next generation. It may sound corny – that’s only because we run the risk of blunting our senses.
An interesting show on offer.
This review by Danny Shorkend first appeared in the Cape Times
WHAT: IN CONTEXT: WHERE WE ARE – A group show
WHERE: Goodman Gallery , 3rd Floor Fairweather House 176 Sir Lowry Rd Woodstock Cape Town7925
WHEN: Until 3rd December
PHOTO: Kudzanai Chiurai, Genesis [Je n’isi isi] – detail
021 462 7573/4
