Archive: Issue No. 84, August 2004

01.08.04 Paul Weinberg at the NSA Gallery
01.08.04 'Abangafuneki' at the NSA Gallery
01.08.04 Theresa-Anne Mackintosh at the NSA Gallery
01.08.04 'Heads' at artSpace Durban
01.08.04 Gabi Ngcobo at artSpace Durban
01.08.04 'Imvubelo' at DAG and Bat Centre

PIETERMARITZBURG

01.08.04 Artists Action Around Aids at the Tatham Art Gallery

Paul Weinberg's latest offering, 'Travelling Light' comes in the form of a book and exhibition that reflect 25 years of the artist's photographic journey, from its inception in the 1970s to the present day.

Weinberg is one of South Africa's best known photographers whose journey is presented as a lyrical narrative that begins in the streets of Jo'burg in the late 1970s and ends in the rural and desert landscapes of the new millennium.

It is not a political A to Z or a documentary of our political past, but an observation of the lives of ordinary people and their daily survival choices as they have struggled and overcome the limiting circumstances of their lives - or simply reflected the tenor of their times.

Key in Weinberg's narrative is the personal engagement that he brings to his photographs. This is a collection of moments that he has cherished both photographically and emotionally.

The book Travelling Light is published by University of KwaZulu-Natal Press and comprises 90 images, complemented by private observations from Weinberg's diaries which he kept throughout these years. The exhibition is an edited version of the book, comprising 45 framed 12x16 inch images with an introduction and captions.

Opens: 6pm, August 3
Closes: August 22

'Abangafuneki' is a group show that investigates and responds to the recent spate of corporate-funded art competitions. As the visual art world continues in its ongoing struggle for government and civil support it seems it is the corporate world that is ruling the roost. Such financial injections are much needed, but what are the long-term benefits to the visual art industry? How do artists position themselves to benefit from this patronage?

'Abangafuneki' takes the form of an art-historical phenomenon, the 'Salon de Refuse'. The first exhibition of this nature was in 1863 in France, when thousands of works were rejected from the official 'Salon', an annual state-sponsored exhibition. The rejected artists and their supporters mounted their own 'Salon' in protest at their rejection.

The isiZulu term Abangafuneki translates as 'rejected' or 'not wanted', and the exhibition is an ironic and tongue-in-cheek comment on work not selected for a recent art competition. It throws up interesting questions around selection procedures and criteria and the importance of curatorial visions in these selections.

As the saying goes - 'All art competitions are unfair, but some are more unfair than others'.

Opens: 6pm, August 3
Closes: August 22 at noon

Opening on August 24 in the NSA's Main Gallery and the Multi Media room is Theresa-Anne Mackintosh's 'Jackie the Kid', her second solo show. Mackintosh works as a painter and also in 'new media' and her work straddles these two seemingly disparate disciplines, allowing the two to feed from each other to create a conversation between her two-dimensional work and animated pieces. Thus the artist charts new possibilities in both media.

The work draws on varied sources, from the work of Marlene Dumas to the contemporary Japanese Pop Art scene, including figures such as Takashi Murakami and Aya Takano. As her influences might suggest, the work brings together a number of contrasting spaces: interior dream spaces are contrasted with an exterior humdrum reality; gritty real life with the luminescent, almost na�ve character of contemporary popular culture.

On show will be her new digital animation that forms the core component of the show. Though she uses digital platforms, Mackintosh's work remains rooted in her painterly iconography.

Opens: 6pm August 24
Closes: September 12

'Heads' is a group show by Garret artists, who are students of advanced drawing supervised by Jeanette Gilks. The exhibition consists of drawings from each student, each investigating new ways in 'seeing' and the use of unfamiliar drawing techniques.

Opens: 6pm, August 2
Closes: August 14

'Homecoming' is Gabi Ngcobo's first solo exhibition. Ngcobo, a Durban-based artist and cultural activist, investigates the concept of 'home' as a place of lived experiences, a place where ideas picked up along the way are unpacked; ideas that tell of the fears, triumphs and struggles of the artist when confronting her own world. The work explores identity, the act of (re)membering, of conversation and of change.

Ngcobo has attended workshops and residencies locally and internationally for the past four years and sees this exhibition as reflecting her journeys. New doors have been opened, allowing the artist to interrogate the spaces she occupies as a woman and artist in a South African context. The exhibition comprises paintings, hair pieces and a video performance.

Opens: 6pm, August 18
Closes: September 8

The Bat Centre in collaboration with the Durban Art Gallery have curated a travelling exhibition of work produced by women artists in celebration of Women's Day this year, the 10th anniversary of democracy.

The exhibition titled 'Imvubelo', a Zulu word signifying the final stage of traditional beer brewing, is aimed at confronting and celebrating the importance of art and its role in society. It will also provide a platform for dialogue about the social, contemporary and ideological identities of women.

Phumzile Dlamini of the DAG has curated the part of the exhibition opening at the Durban Art Gallery that shows contemporary art practices of women artists. Nontobeko Ntombela of the Bat Centre has put together the other half, which features works by Lesley Magwood Frazer, a painter who trained as a textile designer at the Durban Institute of Technology.

The exhibition will also show works produced at an interactive, collaborative workshop featuring 10 young upcoming women artists based in Durban. The workshop and exhibition culminating from it, entitled 'We Are Here', runs from August 2 to 6.

Opens: 5.30pm, August 6 at the DAG and 1pm, August 9 at the Bat Centre.
Closes: September 4

'Artists Action Around Aids' is a large scale group exhibition that explores the role of the visual arts in the struggle against the pandemic, together with the need to reassess the language of the cultural arts as a dynamic force not only as regards to better dispensation for infected and affected communities but also as a means of understanding, exploration, healing, growth and transformation.

The 'physical face of Aids' can in many instances be traced to the dedicated attention of artists as an expression of their broader commitment to archiving, documenting, exploring and expressing the human condition.

The personal and collective psychology surrounding HIV/AIDS reflect the contradictions and paradoxes of a disease that on one hand evokes fear, stigma, alienation, and isolation, but also manifests emotional and social responses of celebration, courage, determination, hope and social upliftment.

Opens: 6pm, June 22
Closes: August 29