International Bauhaus Award for South African-based project and Dave Southwood
The prestigious International Bauhaus Award for 2004, presented on behalf of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation in Germany, has been awarded to Dave Southwood, Matthew Barac, and Simone Le Fevre for their work From Township to Town: Urban Change in Victoria Mxenge TT.
The award winners examined this South African location as an extended moment in time and space. According to the Bauhaus-Dessau website, 'Victoria Mxenge's Metabolism has been dissected in a four-part thematic study that attempts to bring the conditions of transition to account: the planning context and discourse, consumer culture in the townships, the urban vitality known as Africity and the tension between tradition and modernity in South Africa's emerging cities.'
The project is of significance to South Africa not only in subject matter, but also in that one of the winners, Dave Southwood, is a well-known local artist currently studying at University of Fine Arts in Berlin Wei�ensee.
According to the Jury's official declaration, 'The phenomenon of urban poverty and hope was approached with marked sensitivity and a many-sided philosophical complexity. The great thing about this work is that the heart of the project focuses on the people. For future work, the jury advises counteracting the danger of slipping into a voyeuristic perspective, and the development of concrete strategies for positive change in these urban spaces.'
