Sue Williamson at the Michaelis lunchtime lecture
by Kim Gurney
In the 1980s, Sue Williamson was well known for her series of portraits of women involved in the country's political struggle. A Few South Africans went some way to fill the representational void of people and events during apartheid. In many ways, her work over the past couple of years is a return to this terrain.
Williamson, who this month presented the latest Michaelis lunchtime lecture to a packed Cape Town audience, focused on her most recent art: a series of video portraits of South African immigrants. It forms part of a group exhibition called 'Transferts' that is currently showing at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels.
Williamson said her video portraits dealt with issues of globalisation, immigration and disenfranchisement. The subjects were dressed and seated as for a classical portrait, against a backdrop of Cape Town. They were requested to sit still while being filmed for some minutes and none of the takes were re-shot.
The final work comprises the video footage projected as a large-scale portrait onto the gallery wall while the voices of the subjects simultaneously tell viewers about their experience. Williamson said: "It was interesting how people felt they didn't have a voice. Some people started crying because so much had been bottled up."
Body language is a key part of the work's meaning. Williamson said: "One person sits absolutely motionless but every now and again he nods, so you realize it is not a slide projection."
Another person, Cynthia, sways slightly backwards and forwards in a disconcerting rhythm as she stands. A couple, Albert and Isobel, sit very still but Isobel's hand begins to tap as the story gets tense. The only person who manages to keep absolutely motionless throughout is Francois, a former politician from Burundi, who narrowly escaped the country with his life following a grenade attack on his office.
Williamson acknowledged that her new video portraits related to her 1980s series of South African women. She said: "In a sense, these works are updates of those. They are the new people who are struggling to make a life for themselves." Although issues like xenophobia do surface in the interviews, Williamson said her portraits had no particular agenda. "I am just trying to make work about the things around us," she added.
Williamson also showed brief clips from a CD-Rom published in March in conjunction with a monograph (published by Double Story) on selected works. The publication formed part of her residency earlier this year at the Centre for Contemporary Art in Brussels.
The monograph covers the past decade, including her work related to the Truth Commission and public sculpture on HIV/ AIDS called From the Inside (2000-2). Nicholas Dawes, who writes the foreword, finds further parallels with A Few South Africans and Williamson's AIDS-related work. The CD-Rom version of the monograph is a great way to view Williamson's work because much of it is installation. It gives the viewer a more three-dimensional sense and, coupled with the audio, a closely simulated viewing experience.
August 6
Michaelis School of Fine Art, Michaelis Lecture Theatre, Cape Town
For details of the next lecture visit http://www.michaelis.uct.ac.za
