Elaine Matthews
Quest - A Journey into
Sacred Space
1997
An installation made as
part of the '!Xoe' project
at Nieu Bethesda



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This is a free space for the exchange of information of general interest to artists. ArtThrob reserves the right to edit contributions.

Invitation to hike to site-specific installation

On Sunday March 21, the date of the autumn equinox, artist Elaine Matthews is inviting people to climb to the summit of Gaika's Kop, near Hogsback, where she has made an installation in collaboration with the poet Norman Morrissey. Gaikas Kop has been chosen as the site of the work because of its symbolic, historical and geographical significance.

Matthews is a site-specific installation artist who works in the landscape of the Eastern Cape, and the focus of her work is towards creating an awareness of the sacred in nature. She is concerned with re-evaluating the relationships between spirituality and ecology, humanity and the environment. Her work is often situated in wild and sacred places and is of a temporary nature. People are invited to visit the sites, in a manner that is reminiscent of a pilgrimage or quest.

Visitors to the site are advised to prepare themselves for a strenuous walk up the mountain and to wear a good pair of hiking boots, a weatherproof jacket, and sunblock and to carry two litres of water. It would also be a good idea to bring a picnic lunch to enjoy after the opening ceremony, which will include a poetry reading by Norman Morrissey and a walking of the spiral labyrinth.

For more information, contact the artist at ematthews@yebo.co.za.

Prix Ars Electronica 99

From: Dagmar Schmidleitner

We would like to invite you to take part in an international computer art competition.

In Austria every year the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation organize the world's most reknowned and highest prized competition for computer and multimedia art - Prix Ars Electronica 1999. Prize: US$ 116 379.

You can participate in one of the following categories:
Computer animation/visual effects (computer animation refers to independent productions from the fields of art, science, etc). Visual effects refers to commercial high-end productions from the fields of film, advertising, entertainment, etc.
Interactive Art
Net (eg web galleries)
Digital music (eg digital artistic sound creations, electronica, performances, soundspace projects, net music, radio works, soundscapes, etc).

We would like to reach artists from all over the world to participate in our competition. If you are interested and need detailed information or have further questions please contact me at dagmar@prixars.orf.at or get information and an entry form from http://prixars.orf.at.

Web listings offered to artists

From: TJ de Klerk

The arts and culture website artslink.co.za is now offering a free service to visual artists: a listing of a business card and a picture of one piece of work. Every art gallery in the country will also get a free web page.

It's all a part of the expansion programme of the site. In January, Artzone was launched to turn artslink.co.za's unique database of the South African arts and culture industry - events, news, people, facilities, organisations - into a fast and user-friendly resource.

Media releases sent to artslink.co.za are distributed via e-mail to the media and to the Acemail database - members of the public who have subscribed to receive arts news. That information is also archived.

The SA Arts and Culture Calendar is an up-to-date listing available giving details of almost 100 arts happenings around the country, including performance criteria for artists wishing to participate.

For more info, contact webmaster TJ de Klerk at artslink@icon.co.za or phone (011) 487-3689, or fax (011) 648-6191.

Centre for Photography February Newsletter

From: Geoff Grundlingh

Once again "the office" has had a busy month. There was a very interesting evening at the Centre with Magnum photographer Abass. The Werner Bischof documentary shown at the BioCafe was also well received (see Jenny's reports below). The Colorcraft digital workshop with Dennis Biela was another first for the Centre. The Kim Stern/Jenny Altschuler workshop currently running every Monday and Wednesday evening is helping to fill the coffers for a few months. The Kodak money has been deposited and its presence has given us all a lift.

From now onwards Robyn Rorke will be in the office every afternoon except Mondays. This is a great leap forward and we can now be far more efficient. It's thanks to Jenny Altschuler's workshop programme that Robyn will get paid a salary from now on. Svea, Tracey, Kim, Jenny, Sasa, George and Sue have all given of their time for the workshop programmes. Thank you.

There was a very nice article on the Centre in the Friday section of the Mail & Guardian. We are also negotiating with the M&G to run a camera collecting project for Tracey's Street Photographer programme.

I am off to Namibia, Botswana, Zim and Mozambique early in March to find interesting work to bring to Cape Town in September for the first Photo Biennial. I'll be back early in April. The first Cape Town biennial (will someone please come up with a more interesting name) is scheduled for this September and will be a regular bi-annual event from now on. Generally speaking the curatorial content will be Southern African photography in order to showcase regional talent.

Cavendish Square has asked us to bring an edited version of the founding party collection to the mall in June. As this will be a good marketing excercise for the Centre (we will also display details of our educational and job creation drives and may call for cameras) I am trying to make room in our busy schedule to organise this. I would also like to use Cavendish as an exhibition venue for the September festival. Lien Botha has proposed a great project for the festival which involves laundromats, 100 photographers, the sea and the century. I can't say more at this stage. Lien is also involved in the Leonardo da Vinci show coming to Pretoria. She will work with our Michaelis students on a photo project and the results will hopefully be exhibited in Pta in July.

Structures, the David Goldblatt exhibition opens at the National Gallery on Saturday March 6 at 11 am. Don't miss it please.

Housekeeping. Our new iMac is on its way. Sans scanner to begin with, but a huge boon nevertheless to all our current and proposed projects. Thank you Margaret and Project 3 for all your help and a special quote.

Thanks also to Werner Doll who sat in the gallery for an entire week to keep the founding collection open to the public.

Jean Brundrit has agreed to run the office in my March absence. E-mail Jean after March 6 at jbr@maties.sun.ac.za.


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