Archive: Issue No. 97, September 2005

EUROPE

2.09.05 Kendell Geers on ADAM in Amsterdam
2.09.05 Candice Breitz at White Cube in London
2.09.05 Katherine Bull at ON Gallery in Poznan

5.08.05 Guy Tillim at the Photographer's Gallery in London
5.08.05 Orientations and Illusions at prog:Me in Rio
5.08.05 Jan-Henri Booyens at J'en Reve in Paris

1.07.05 'Looking Both Ways' in Edinburgh
1.07.05 'ART out of place' in Norwich
1.07.05 [prologue] new feminism / new europe in Manchester

3.06.05 51st Venice Biennale
3.06.05 Prague Biennale
3.06.05 'meanwhile in Africa...' in Germany

THE AMERICAS

2.09.05 Ed Young at Videobrasil
2.09.05 South African Printmakers in Illinois
2.09.05 Candice Breitz at Sonnabend in New York

5.08.05 Kendell Geers at inSite_05 on the Mexican Border
 

Kendell Geers on ADAM in Amsterdam

Kendell Geers joins a host of international artists in the ADAM exhibition with his posters In God Wet Rust which will be shown all over the city. The exhibition is curated by Thomas Peutz and Una Henry and is scattered through the city of Amsterdam. ADAM is an international exhibition of contemporary art and is committed to the development and realisation of 30 new projects that engage with the situational context of everyday life. All the artists have been commissioned to appropriate and re-interpret the socio-political conditions of Amsterdam, questioning cultural and social identity at a given place and at a particular moment in time.

ADAM is an examination of cultural space, addressing issues of location and habitation, questioning ideas about where we live and how we live, taking perspectives which are emotional, cultural and symbolic. ADAM reflects the moment and takes as its point of departure the dynamics of art-as-activity, whereby modes of action lead to new ways of understanding aspects of contemporary artistic production in both the public and private spheres.

Opens: September 3
Closes: October 16

Candice Breitz at White Cube in London

Candice Breitz presents 'Mother + Father' in London at the White Cube gallery, owned by Jay Jopling, whose stable includes big-names like Damien Hirst.

Breitz is known for her work in deconstructing media, particularly her re-edits of Hollywood movies and music videos. In 'Mother+Father', the latest in this series, Breitz has identified key scenes in popular Hollywood films which focus on the roles of mothers or fathers, and digitally blacked out everything in the frame except the parental figure. Isolated in this manner, the clichéd and repetitious manner in which Hollywood presents family relationships becomes obvious.

Opens: September 6

Katherine Bull at ON Gallery in Poznan

On Friday September 9, South African artist Katherine Bull will present an exhibition and performance entitled 'data capture: in the field' at ON Gallery in Poznan. The performance will take place from 4pm to 6pm, concurrent with the Open Portfolio session at the Zamek Cultural Centre. ON Gallery is located just behind Zamek (on Ul. Fredry 7) so it will be convenient for delegates to attend both activities.

Opens: September 9

Guy Tillim at the Photographer's Gallery in London

Guy Tillim exhibits diptychs and triptychs of colour photographs of the Congo region in his series 'Leopold and Mobutu' at the Photographer's Gallery in London. The photographs explore the traces of the colonial occupation of the Congo by King Leopold II of Belgium alongside remnants of the Congo's more recent pillaging under Mobutu Sese Seko. (see Reviews)

Opens: August 12
Closes: September 25

Orientations and Illusions at 'prog:Me' in Rio

'Orientations and Illusions' is a large group show curated by Miguel Petchkovsky for 'prog:Me', the first electronic arts festival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The artists selected occupy a diverse range of cultural spaces and explore how individual experience, identity and social and personal memory find expression in contemporary art practice.

South African artists Tracey Rose, Zen Marie, Gregg Smith, Moshekwa Langa, Thando Mama, Dineo Bopape , Dean Henning and Rick Sitas as well as Peter van Heerden are included in the exhibition.

Opens: July 8
Closes: September 18

Jan-Henri Booyens at J'en Reve in Paris

Jan-Henri Booyens exhibits his video piece, B.W.A.M, in 'J'en Reve' at the Cartier Foundation in Paris. 'J'en Reve' is an exhibition of 58 young artists from around the world, mostly in their early 20s. The participants are recommended by internationally renowned artists and the show functions as a celebration of youth and all its joys and insecurities. Booyen's trained at the Durban Institute of technology and is now resident in Cape Town.

Opens: June 24
Closes: October 30

Looking Both Ways in Edinburgh

The highly acclaimed exhibition, 'Looking Both Ways: Art of the Contemporary African Diaspora' originally opened in 2003 at the Museum for African Art in New York, and now moves to Edinburgh to coincide with the Edinburgh Festival and G8 Summit.

The exhibition, curated by Laurie Ann Farell, 'explores the increasing globalization of the African diaspora through the presentation of Africa-born artists who now live and work in the West', with the title of the exhibition referring to the artists' practice of looking at the ever shifting terrains of Africa and the West and the complex geographies in between.

Kendell Geers constructs a museum of African/other art within the museum, using steel factory shelving and panels of poured concrete set with shards of broken green glass for his enclosure. His 'exhibits,' ranging from flea market African artefacts to a Shiva figure to a statuette of Lara Croft are all wrapped in Geers' signature chevron tape.

Moshekwa Langa presents a series of energetic mixed media work. His Garden of Earthly Delights, a visual version of one of Langa's 'list' works, packs the picture frame with faces, one of them possibly a self portrait, a jet, a village hut, a stray with bared teeth, spiders and webs and a pasted cat.

The full list of participating artists is: Fernando Alvim, Ghada Amer, Oladélé A. Bamgboyé, Allan deSouza, Kendell Geers, Moshekwa Langa, Hassan Musa, N'Dilo Mutima, Wangechi Mutu, Ingrid Mwangi, Zineb Sedira and Yinka Shonibare.

Opens: June 18
Closes: September 11

Frances Goodman on 'ART out of place'

Norwich Castle in Norfolk, England, is the venue for 'ART out of place' a show of contemporary art by a number of leading artists to encourage a confrontation between the old and the new, the museum and the contemporary.

The work is located in all areas of the museum from the natural history and archaeology sections to the corridors, toilets and reception where the work is intended to draw attention to the museum as a social space.

Artists on the exhibition are: Dorothy Cross, Neil Cummings and Marysia Lewandowska, Frances Goodman, Lucy Gunning, Des Hughes, Marina Kappos, Richard Long, Rory Macbeth and Darren Phizacklea, Cornelia Parker, Marc Quinn, Gavin Turk, Elizabeth Wright.

July 2 - September 25, 2005

[prologue] new feminism / new europe

The result of a Europe-wide project that sets out to examine the social, economic and cultural position of women in the new Europe, [prologue] new feminism / new europe is a radical and witty exhibition and weekend of live performances by female artists addressing prejudice against the word 'feminist' through art. [prologue] will consider a young generation of artists unafraid to be known as feminists. Collectively organised by seven curators from venues across Europe, the gallery-based exhibition at Cornerhouse and weekend of live-art at Green Room will feature 27 artists from 17 countries. The project will see Manchester welcome participating artists, academics and delegates to discuss theory, activism, and the visual and political forces affecting women in the new Europe.

Artists featuring in the gallery show include Chicks on Speed, Frances Goodman, Senam Okudzeto, Anna Jermolaewa.

[prologue] Live, a weekend of live-art, interventions and performances at Green Room, extends the traditional frame of the gallery exhibition and allows for the experience of live art - an essential medium in which feminist artists have worked for generations. It will begin on Friday 29 July and conclude on Sunday 31 July with a brunch and one-day symposium featuring Katy Deepwell, editor of n.paradoxa; and theoretrician and Alena Williams, an Art Historian from Colombia University, New York and an internet consultant to Rhizome; with artists from the exhibition and curators in conversation about the value of feminist criticism.

Exhibition: July 30 - September 18, Cornerhouse, Manchester

Live Art Weekend: 29 - 31 July 29 - 31, Green Room, Manchester

51st Venice Biennale opens

Under the direction of the first women to be appointed to the position, Maria de Corral, and Rosa Martinez, the most venerable of the world's biennales, the 51st Venice Biennale, opens in the Giardini di Castello and its surroundings on June 12. Continually lambasted by critics from all sides for not presenting a cohesive vision of the new, the event holds its position as the grand old lady of the art calendar. For a full rundown on the event and the South African participation, go to Andrew Lamprecht's preview on News.

Opens: June 12
Closes: November 6

Prague Biennale: A Second Sight

Opening immediately after the Venice Biennale (and one might have thought it would have been politic to wait a day or two longer so the international art crowd could finish partying in Venice before moving on), the International Biennale of Contemporary Art - A Second Sight will showcase the work of 400 artists from 20 countries. The biennale will 'focus on the traditional phenomena of post modern culture', presenting extensive new media projects while not abandoning the 'traditional' media of painting and sculpture.

German gallerist Dr Ralf Seippel has curated the African section of the biennale, entitled 'African Facets', pointing out in a curatorial statement that Africa 'cannot be pressed in to an artistic idiom just as little as the rest of the world. The positions that are presented in 'African Facets' consistently deal with African history, identity and urbanity'.

Participating artists are: Mbongeni Buthelezi, Zwelethu Mthethwa and Beezy Bailey, Minnette Vàri and Andrew Tshabangu from South Africa, Ingrid Mwangi from Kenya and Susan Hefuna from Egypt. A catalogue, in Czech and English will be available.

Opens: June 13
Closes: September 11

'Meanwhile in Africa...': presentations in Germany

'Gleichzeitig in Afrika...' is a series of lectures and artistic presentations to take place in a number of venues in Germany this month. Curated by Christian Hanussek under the auspices of Africome, a governmental information organisation, the series was conceived, says Hanussek because art in Africa 'remains rather an exotic topic in the German art world'. Lectures will be accompanied by presentations of a number of initiatives from across Africa, one of which will be the CDRom ArtThrob: The Archive 1998-2003

The programme remaining is:

'Taxis Zinkpe', installation by Dominique Zinkpe

Opens: 11am, June 3
Closes: September 4

Iwalewa House, Bayreuth
Munzgasse 9

Ed Young at Videobrasil

Ed Young and Max Raffard's video piece, St. Motherfucking Maxim's Day, which records the artists stealing a pair of shoes from the Palais de Tokyo in 2004, will be shown on the 'Southern Panoramas' and 'Contemporary Investigations' segments of the 15th Videobrasil International Electronic Art Festival in Brazil. With 143 Brazilian and 53 foreign guests, including artists, curators, theorists and journalists, Videobrasil runs over three weeks. These include intense programming, involving 130 works in competition, nine performances, 10 video screenings, six round table debates, three live-image nights, nine meetings with artists, a performance workshop and five launches.

Each week is given over to one of the three axes in the competitive exhibition. These are entitled 'Southern Panoramas: State of the Art' (from September 6 to 11), 'Contemporary Investigations' (September 13 to 18), and 'New Vectors' (September 20 to 25). Each axis carries a cash prize and a residency offered by the Festival in conjunction with an art school or media centre.

Opens: September 6
Closes: September 26

South African Printmakers in Illinois

'Memorias de un Mexicano: Homage to Francisco Mora' is an exhibition that unifies the contemporary print works of African-American, Chicano, Mexican and South African printmakers. The exhibition serves as a tribute to the late Mexican printmaker and painter, Francisco Mora (1922 - 2002) who was a member of the famed Taller Grafica Popular, a printmakers' collaborative based in Mexico City.

The exhibition title, 'Memorias de un Mexicano' ('Memories of the Mexican'), was the title of a series of prints produced by Francisco Mora. This series pays homage to the Mexican labourer. South Africa is represented by Sipho Hlati, Velile Soha and Ernestine White. The latter artist has a BFA degree from State University of New York (Albany New York) and is attending Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town for her MFA degree in printmaking. White concentrates on aluminium plate lithography and participated in Tamarind's Master Printer programme where she was certified as a Tamarind Master Printer.

Hlati meanwhile is a visual arts practitioner living and working in Cape Town. His training is diverse: from 2000 - 01, he studied at Michaelis, in 1998 he served a residency at Robben Island, and between 1987 and '89, he trained at the Community Arts Project, in Cape Town. He has taken part in a number of group exhibitions in South Africa and abroad.

Soha studied visual art at the Rorke's Drift Art School, from 1981 - 83, and has also worked and lectured at the Nyanga Art Centre, in Cape Town. Of his work Soha states: 'I am a realistic artist, mixing colours in order to use them as naturally as possible. I express myself mostly through township and rural scenes, like homelands. My aim is to show how my people live their lives'.

Jesus Macarena-Avila, who served a residency with the Robert Blackburn's Printmaking Workshop in New York City, was recently a resident at Cape Town's Greatmore Studios. This explains the large number of local artists on this subterranean exhibition, and underlines the importance of grassroots exchange.

Opens: August 22

Closes: September 16

Candice Breitz at Sonnabend in New York

Candice Breitz will be showing 'Mother + Father' in New York at the Sonnabend gallery. This is the same work she is showing at London's White Cube in London and her simultaneous presence at these two galleries is a measure of her increasing importance in the international art world.

Opens: September 17

Kendell Geers at 'inSite_05' on the Mexican Border

Kendell Geers, the man South African artists love to hate, is taking part in the museum-based component of 'inSite_05' on the Mexico/San Diego border. The exhibition, 'Farsites: Urban Crisis and Domestic Symptoms in Recent Contemporary Art', is organised by the San Diego Museum of Art and the Centro Cultural Tijuana and infiltrates a number of galleries spanning the two areas. For more than 10 years, inSite has focused on stimulating artistic practices that explore what we understand by the terms 'public', 'urban', and 'border' and 'Farsites' is the culmination of two years of lectures, public projects and artists' residencies.

Opens: August 27
Closes: November 13