implicit art

South Africa’s new premiere, biennial, contemporary exhibition and competition opened last night in the Cape. Sounds like an amazing exhibition, with lots of young, new names whose careers will hopefully be launched through their wins. Sorry to miss it, but I’m sure there’ll be lots of coverage in the coming months. I feel like it should be noted that Tegan Bristow’s piece, was not just a video, but also interactive - she’s a former student of mine and currently teaches in the Digital Arts department at the University of the Witwatersrand.

From here:

And the winners are:

• Abrie Fourie for his photographic works: Beverley Hills, Sunnyside, Pretoria 2007 and Changing Room, Hillcrest Swimming Pool, Pretoria 2007;

• Chuma Sopotela, Mwenya Kabwe and Kemang Wa Lehulere for their performance U nyamo alunampumlo (The foot has no nose), a work that explores African urban centres, through a hybrid of theatrical forms including live-feed video projection, living installations and live performance work;

•Bettina Malcomess, Rene Holleman and Linda Stupart for their performance Doing it for Daddy, a walking tour of the Spier Estate which reimages real and fictional histories;

• Nina Barnett and Robyn Nesbitt for their video Warcry, a challenging and thrilling look at the war cries of two Johannesburg schools;

• Andrew Putter for Secretly I will love you more, a haunting video installation based on three paintings in the Castle of Good Hope in which the portrait of Maria van Riebeek sings a Khoi Khoi lovesong-lullaby, celebrating her love for Krotoa, her adopted Khoi Khoi daughter; and

• Peter van Heerden for his performance Die Uitlander, the African and the Vrouw, which looks at the patriotism, dedication and resolve of African women.

Receiving special mention were: Tegan Bristow for her video Chalk Vision; Bongani Joseph Khoza for his video On Trains with Bongani; and Kai Losgott and Anthea Moys for their video Unsaid.

There is one more award still to be made. This is the People’s Choice Award.Anyone visiting the exhibition can vote for their favorite artwork. On 20 February 2008 when the exhibition will close on the Spier Estate, the final winner will be announced. The seven award winners will share the prize money of R700,000. All the prizes will be some type of self study, residency programme or another which promotes or progresses the artist’s career.

Bishop Desmond Tutu seems to be one of few outspoken and visible Apartheid heroes that still speaks a lot of sense. The quotes below are from this article on the Mail & Guardian, where Tutu is talking about Mbeki and Zuma in SA, but I think America has a lot to gain from his insights, too.

 “We don’t seem to be talking about policy differences between the two leaders. It’s merely a question of personality and how much attraction the one candidate has over the other.”…

“We’re feeling insecure because of the violence and crime and it makes us feel very worried indeed. Living behind locked doors and high walls and electric fences is not good for us and our leader needs to know this.”…

“My father used to have an expression: ‘Improve your argument, don’t raise your voice’ … It’s a very good saying. The public discourse has deteriorated in quality and now we have leaders who are not the sharpest thinkers and they’re carrying the day and we shouldn’t allow that to happen.”

“We should be frank and talk about the things that are not okay in our society… There are far better things in which to invest energy and resources.”

Read the whole article.