Archive: Issue No. 137, January 2009

03.02.09 Johannes Phokela and David Andrew at Standard Bank Gallery
27.01.09 'Prints, Multiples and Photography VI' at Warren Siebrits
15.01.09 Robyn Penn at Brodie/Stevenson
15.01.09 'Oppitafel' at Artspace

30.11.08 Thami Mnyele and the Medu Art Ensemble at the Johannesburg Art Gallery

26.10.08 'Disturbance - Contemporary Art from Scandinavia and South Africa' at JAG

The Standard Bank Gallery kicks off the year with a duo of shows sure to get you fired up. Critically-acclaimed painter Johannes Phokela's 'I like my neighbours' features a body of new work as well as recent works from numerous private and public collections.

Phokela continues his exploration of cultural and political consumption of pictures, a process mirrored in his own voracious consumption of images. Phokela draws on iconic paintings from European art history, works by Rubens, Van Dyck and Caravaggio, but just as readily on newspapers, magazines and web-based sources. His paintings marry the gravitas of art history with the apparently endless stream of media and popular culture images.

David Andrew's concurrent show, 'Misc (Recovery Room)' is a furthering of this artist's interrogation of the relationship between art-making and teaching. Drawing together a number of threads, the show speculates on how art teaching may be pursued in non-traditional forms. The central philosophical and practical question Andrew posits is 'how can the teacher perform more like the artist?', considering which particular patterns present in classrooms and schools could allow for a more 'artful' learning and teaching experience. The show explores these notions and plots a course to such a reality through a 'miscellany of drawings, notebooks, objects, photographs and installation'.

Opens: February 3
Closes: March 21

Warren Siebrits Modern and Contemporary presents 'Prints, Multiples and Photography VI' as its first exhibition this year. The show is sure to have more of Siebrits' rare gems of SA and international printmaking and photography.

Opens: January 27
Closes: March 6

Brodie/Stevenson starts the year with an exhibition of paintings by Robyn Penn entitled 'A Brutal Year'. The show explores illness, loss, pregnancy, the lapse of time and 'the space you inhabit when you are very ill or when someone very close to you is very ill', which the artist states 'is like a twilight zone or a perpetual noon, the place where light and shadow meet or morning shifts into afternoon'.

Opens: January 15
Closes: February 14

The 2008 edition of Artspace's annual 'Oppitafel' carries on into early 2009. The show sees the fusion of lighting design with ceramic art work.

Artists and designers taking part are Poorvi Bhana, Deon de Lange, Chris Diedericks, Muziwandile Gigaba, Eugene Honn, Loren Kaplan, Naomi Klingenberg, Karen Kotze, Andrew Lindsay, Simon Masilo, Andile Mdluli, Lynette Morris-Hale, Margo Rudolph, Sadia Salin, Anthony Shapiro, John Shirley, Karin Sinovich, Nic Sithole, Smelt Lamp Ware, Nikki Swanepoel, Twiice International, Margaret Woerman and Zizamele Artists.

Opens: December 3
Closes: January 24

'Thami Mnyele and the Medu Art Ensemble' aims to give an overview of the artistic output of this ANC-initiated cultural organisation which was founded by Dr Wally Serote in 1978. Medu was disbanded after a SADF raid left Mnyele and 11 others dead in 1985.

Of particular importance to Medu's visual art contribution is the 1982 'Symposium on Culture and Resistance', which was a major gathering of South African and international cultural activists in Gaborone, Botswana. The symposium was accompanied by an exhibition of South African exiles' work entitled 'Art towards social development', which was curated by Thami Mnyele and Gordon Mentz.

Opens: November 30
Closes: March 31

'Disturbance - Contemporary Art from Scandinavia and South Africa' aims to examine the relationship that Scandinavian and South African artists have with respect to identity and notions of place. The project's thematic will focus explicitly on 'disturbance' as a concept to explore ruptures in society.

Curated by Clive Kellner and Maria Fidel Regueros, the show will include work by Torbjørn Rødland, Goksøyr & Martens, Bodil Furu, and Urstad, with South African artists including Anthea Moys, Lerato Shadi and Siemon Allen.

Opens: October 26
Closes: February 28