Archive: Issue No. 104, April 2006

11.04.06 'Picasso and Africa' at the Iziko SANG
11.04.06 Wim Botha at the SANG
11.04.06 Guy Tillim at Michael Stevenson
11.04.06 Roger Ballen at the Photographer's Gallery za
11.04.06 'Take it Like a Man' at blank projects
11.04.06 21st ABSA L'Atelier Awards Regional Exhibition at Artb
11.04.06 Johann van der Schijff at Bell-Roberts
11.04.06 'Facing the Past' at the SANG
11.04.06 Zapiro at the Old Town House
11.04.06 Leon Vermeulen and Tyrrel Thaysen at the AVA
11.04.06 Stephen Inggs at João Ferreira
11.04.06 Jenny Parsons, Catherina Pagani and Thembelani Lisa at the AVA
11.04.06 'Fusion Africa' at 34Long
11.04.06 A Tribute to Picasso by local artists at the Alliance Française du Cap
11.04.06 VEO Cape Town Art Fair 2006
11.04.06 Peter Regli at blank projects

2.03.06 Zanele Muholi and Rotimi Fani-Kayodé at Michael Stevenson
2.03.06 Noria Mabasa at Bell-Roberts
2.03.06 Bernd Ada Mer at 3RD I GALLERY

13.01.06 Woven into Life: Basketry in South Africa at the Castle of Good Hope
 

'Want to see a woman with three eyes protruding from her elbow?' asked the Heritage Agency in one of many intriguing 'Picasso and Africa' advertising campaigns. Said exhibition opens at SANG this month, representing a collaboration between one of Paris' Picasso Museum's leading curators, Laurence Madeline, and Marilyn Martin, Director of Art Collections at Iziko South African National Gallery. It offers, for the first time, a dialogue between Africa and Picasso and explores the influence of African art on his artistic output, in the company of 'classical African pieces'.

A major loan from the Picasso Museum has been augmented by works from the Musée National d'Art Moderne, the Centre Pompidou, as well as the Picasso family and other lenders. The exhibition has three distinct yet interrelated components: More than 60 paintings, drawings and sculptures, dating from 1906 to 1972, which contain and communicate Picasso's African inspiration; a selection of works that reflect the diversity and rapid changes of which he was capable; and a selection of African sculptures, similar to those with which Picasso may have been familiar, which have been sourced from various South African holdings.

Opens: April 13
Closes: May 23

2005 Standard Bank Young Artist award winner, Wim Botha's 'Premonitions of War' comes to the National Gallery after well received shows in Grahamstown and Durban. It did, however, generate controversy at its last stopover in Bloemfontein. The show features a collection of the artist's iconic and iconoclastic pieces, challenging a range of gods, from Jesus to JH Pierneef.

Opens: April 8
Closes: May 28

In this new series of colour photographs, entitled 'Petros Village, Malawi, 2006', award-winning photographer Guy Tillim looks intimately at the daily life of the residents of a village in central Malawi. On two occasions he stayed for a week in the village and quietly observed the conversations and routines of the day. His lyrical images of the residents and the textures of the village linger, evoking stillness and reserve.

The exhibition is also to be seen at the Museo di Roma on the occasion of the fifth edition of the FotoGrafia International Festival of Rome which opens later this month.

Opens: May 3
Closes: June 3

World renowned award-winning photographer Roger Ballen, who is known for the dark 'social commentary' of his previous publications such as Dorps , Small Towns of South Africa, Platteland and Images from Rural South Africa, now explores a more complex approach to the subconscious with 'Shadow Chamber'. While retaining the artist's signature style and subject matter, these works are very different in their complex constructions, use of props, mysticism and sublimity - a fresh offer from this staple figure of the South African artworld.

The book Shadow Chamber will be available for sale at the gallery on the opening night and the artist will be present to sign copies.

Opens: April 4
Closes: May 6

The results of two snapshot photography workshops involving Cape town male sex-workers are on exhibition in a show curated by Pierre Fouché at blank projects this month.

Facilitated by Greatmore Studios resident Pierre Fouché and funded by the Greatmore trust, these workshops were conceived as an experiment in self-representation of the grey areas of sexuality and an attempt to interrogate the traditional domestic snapshot. Seven male sex-workers from a prominent agency were introduced to the world of photography through Instant camera lenses and each was donated a Fuji-instax camera with an open brief to snap their environment and themselves.

The results of the workshop revealed a surprising sensitivity of keen observation in some, and a delightful and playful portrait of Cape Town and surrounds in others, while a select few made direct reference to their working environment. The exhibition aims to gain visibility for individuals forging an existence in negated realms of gender and sexual identity above giving the participants the opportunity to experience the joys (and tribulations) of putting up an exhibition and seeing their work in a public space. In aid of proposed legislative reforms to the sex-work industry as a whole - an attempt spearheaded by the Sex Workers Education and Action taskforce to make South Africa truly free and safe for all - a percentage of sales will be donated to this organisation.

Opens: April 19
Closes: April 28

Artb - The Arts Association of Bellville is hosting the regional exhibition of the 21st ABSA L'Atelier Competition in the Western Cape . This annual competition for artists between 21 and 35, not only ensures South Africa's emerging artists recognition for their work but also an opportunity to study abroad. Five prizes are awarded with an overall winner receiving R100 000 in total from Absa, as well as a return ticket to Paris, France to use for a period of study at the Cité Internationale des Arts. Four additional merit prizes of R20 000 are awarded and the top 10 finalists all receive R1 000 each.

The Western Cape received 122 entries from which 26 works were selected from Benjamin Coutouvidis, Tom Cullberg, Manie du Plessis, Liza Grobler, Trasi Henen, Gina Heter, Ruan Hoffman, Marlise Keith, Marieke Kruger, Luan Nel, Natasha Norman, Ruth Sacks, Lyndi Sales, Pamela Stretton, Linda Stupart, Gretchen van der Byl, Leonora van Staden and James Webb. The judges were: Theo Kleynhans, Keith Diederichs and Berni Searle.

Opens: March 22
Closes: April 26

Johann van der Schijff's exhibition, 'Power Play' playfully examines power relationships in society through encouraging the viewer into considering the physical, and moral, choices they are forced to make as they engage with the work on show. The aesthetics of van der Schiff's pieces evoke shiny show cars and desirable commercial displays in their meticulous polished and military-industrial finishes.

Van der Schijff graduated with a Master's from Michaelis. He subsequently studied further in the Netherlands and more recently helped establish UCT's Master's in New Media course. His work was seen on last year's 2nd Spier Outdoor Sculpture Biennale and at the previous year's 'YDESIRE'. The exhibition will be opened by Pippa Skotnes.

Opens: April 25
Closes: May 20

A decade after the country's Truth and Reconcilliation Commission was established, an exhibition at the Iziko South African National Gallery recognises and reflects on its achievements. The show includes often iconic works by artists such as Steve Hilton-Barber, Rose Kgoete, Kevin Brand and Zwelethu Mthethwa as well as works which 'look to the future' by Given Makhubele and Vuyisani Mgijima among others. All works are from the permanent collection of the Iziko South African National Gallery.

Opens: April 4
Closes: end 2006

Award winning political cartoonist Zapiro, alias Jonathan Shapiro, has long been a household name in South Africa for his biting satire and fluid line.On the back of a major nternational award, 'Sacred Cows Make Large Targets' presents 60 original drawings for published cartoons as well as montages of covers for various books that have been published.

Opens: April 25
Closes: June 11

In the main and long galleries at the AVA this month, Leon Vermeulen is exhibiting recent works on paper and canvas entitled 'Bedlam - TheComplete Picture - Or Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Painting'. Upstairs Tyrrel Thaysen is showing his large sculptures in resin.

Opens: March 27
Closes: April 13

Stephen Inggs' new series of work entitled 'Solitude' is informed by an experiential sense of both ancient and recent history written onto the landscape of the Karoo as 'a site for utopian and dystopian speculation'. The works explore marks that have been left in this vast inhospitable land by millennia of history, from ancient fossils to fences erected in 1800s. Inggs uses once again his signature large format black and white prints on heavy paper.

Opens: April 5
Closes: April 29

Jenny Parsons is an urban landscape painter working mostly in oil on canvas and chalk pastel. For her a landscape painting is a place for the eye and mind to play - where the experience of the landscape and the act of painting hold equal importance. She has an ongoing fascination with vertical objects on the landscape - trees, buildings, lampposts and other structures; as well as the 'drawings' on the land created by roads, paths and other demarcations.These elements suggest and in fact replace a human presence. All of the paintings on this exhibition are made from drawings of Sea Point and Greenpoint and are imbued with a very specific sense of place.

Catherina Pagani as a ceramicist and sculptor has expanded and sometimes abandoned conventional ceramic practice. Technical experiment and inquiry have become an arena for observing elemental processes of minerals and heat. In search of alternative methods to create volumes with different characters and surfaces, Pagani has explored a range of clay mixtures and methods to create the inside-space of a form. To capture the rock-like qualities of stoneware, solid materials were used and sculpted rather than employing conventional ceramic building and construction methods.

Thembelani Lisa is a recent Ruth Prowse School of Art graduate. In this, his first one-person exhibition, he is showing charcoal and pencil drawings.

Opens: April 18
Closes: May 5

Boarding the Picasso bandwagon, 34Long and The Collector jointly present an eclectic collection of African artefacts and artworks, which aim to challenge any preconceived notions about the distinctions between these categories, and highlight the ongoing artistic dialogue between Africa and Europe. Influences and confluences, borrowings and assimilations relate the realities of colonialism in a visual language.

Opens: April 4
Closes: May 6

In order to pay (even more) homage to Pablo Picasso and in collaboration with the SANG's 'Picasso and Africa', the Alliance Française du Cap is organising an exhibition of paintings by Cape artists that are 'inspired by Picasso'. More than 40 candidates, both professional and amateur, have submitted their paintings which were selected by Marilyn Martin, Estelle Jacobs and Patrice Boussekey.

Also within this framework the Alliance Française is organising a special Cineclub at 7pm, April 25 in the Alliance Française hall (155 Loop Street), when documentaries Genèse du tableau Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and Portrait de Picasso will be screened.

The famous film The Mystery of Picasso will also be shown at 6pm, April 20 at the Labia Theatre (68 Orange Street). This film is in French and there are no subtitles but there is very little dialogue as it is based on the painter's visual analysis.

Opens: April 6
Closes: April 26

VEO Gallery is once again hosting the VEO Cape Town Art Fair over the weekend of Friday April 28 to Monday May 1. There will be hundreds of affordable artworks on sale covering a wide range of styles, genres and media, from painting, sculpture and photography to glassware, apparently with something for all tastes and budgets. Entrance is free and there will be refreshments on sale.

Opens: April 28
Closes: May 1

'Dust to Dust' by Swiss Artist Peter Regli is part of a work in progress. Regli is currently working in Cape Town as an artist in residence on Reality Hacking Nr. 235, a project based on the oral and drawn history of extinct indigenous inhabitants of the Western Cape. For more info see: www.realityhacking.ch

Opens: March 29
Closes: April 15

Trained as a photographer at the Market Photo Workshop, prominent activist in black lesbian empowerment organisations and winner of the 2005 Tollman Award, Zanele Muholi came to national attention in September 2004 with her exhibition 'Visual Sexuality: Only half the picture' at JAG. Whether confronting hate crimes against black lesbians or documenting the accoutrements of sex and sexual identity (strap-on dildos, breast-wrapping), Muholi was able to represent the black female body in a frank yet intimate way that challenged the history of the portrayal of black women's bodies in documentary photography. The exhibition will coincide with the publication of a book on her work.

Rotimi Fani-Kayodé was born in Nigeria in 1955 to a family of Yoruba ancestry who left Africa as refugees in 1966 and settled in Britain. He studied in the United States, moved back to London in 1983 and died there of HIV/Aids complications in 1989 at the age of 34.

He wrote: 'On three accounts I am an outsider: in matters of sexuality; in terms of geographical and cultural dislocation; and in the sense of not having become the sort of respectably married professional my parents might have hoped for.' Through the medium of photography, and in collaboration with his partner Alex Hirst, Fani-Kayodé produced a body of work in the 1980s that was not only aesthetically seductive but also seminal in terms of his portrayal of black homosexuality. His images are visually and conceptually provocative in their exploration of eroticism, homophobia, traditions and conventions, and ultimately mortality.

This exhibition is a rare showing of an extensive series of his historic black-and-white images, and the first time a substantial body of his work will be shown in South Africa. The exhibition is presented in conjunction with Autograph, London.

Muholi will conduct a walkabout of her exhibition at 11am, Thursday March 30. It costss R30, proceeds go to the Friends of the South African National Gallery.

Opens: March 29
Closes: April 29

Noria Mabasa is the recipient of the prestigious 'Silver Level of the Order of the Baobab' which was awarded her by President Thabo Mbeki in 2002. Together with Claudette Schreuders, she was commissioned to create a sculpture for the recently opened Nobel Square at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. This will be Mabasa's first solo exhibition in Cape Town, although she has exhibited both locally and abroad and her work is to be found in all of the country's major collections.

Opens: March 22
Closes: April 22

In 'What is Reality', Austrian artist and photographer Bernd Ada Mer exhibits medium format and digital photographic images that explore ideas of reality and photographic truth. The filmic, grainy, urban pace of the images is amplified by their presentation, with each image made up of a series of compositions, a 'multiple photoimage reality'.

Opens: March 15
Closes: April 22

This exhibition in the Grain Cellar at the Castle of Good Hope intends to reveal the artistry of southern African baskets, paying tribute to the deep environmental knowledge and ways of life of South African basket-makers, past and present. The baskets on display cover a wide range of techniques, uses and regions of origin, collectively reflecting the knowledge and skill of their creators, as well as the beauty to be found in these practical constructions.

Opens: December 20
Closes: July 1