kain
south african art
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giant steps
tonight, tuesday 27 september, at 7pm, museum africa, 121 bree street, newtown, it’s the world premiere, all visitors to nathaniel’s blog are welcome to attend. if you can’t make it watch the broadcast by sabc1 on monday night at 10pm, 3 october.
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doin the Sean
For those of you who didn’t notice, we added yet another guest blogger to our ranks a short while ago!
Sean Slemon, a South African artist currently doing his MFA at Pratt in NYC (and winner of the 2005 Sasol New Signatures award), will be doing occasional write-ups of exhibitions, shows, performances and talks over in the five boroughs.
And I will be writing about his solo show in Chelsea this November, at David Krut – NYC here I come! Hey Sean, should I ask to write about it for a more professional SA pub, too? Not that they like me or anything…. Or you, for that matter.
Psyched to have you on board, Sean.
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i like goldblatt, too
david goldblatt at the goodman gallery, johannesburg
There’s so much on David Goldblatt right now. His retrospective at the Johannesburg Art Gallery, his new work at the Goodman Gallery, three articles in Art South Africa, and heaps of other reviews for the two shows – one of which has travelled worldwide and has a companion book. Hell, just below this post, Franci Cronje wrote a short review on my own blog (thanks, lady!).
An extremely skilled photographer, with ripe – but not overtly politicized – images, this man is unquestionably the most influential person in his medium, in all of South African history; and he will likely remain so for a very, very long time. His “compassionate eye” has documented the likes of many of SA’s varying peoples, over a span of 50+ years, and his work becomes more refined – into a non-intrusive subjective space – with each image he creates.
A master at creating photo publications, essays and serial works, as much as he is a genius with each individual frame, his JAG show is utterly overwhelming. I have been back and forth a few times now, and I barely manage to make it through each turn. The Goodman show is less of a struggle, but no less beautiful. Landscapes of the urban, the suburban, the rural, people landscapes, and combinations thereof – I recommend you spend time with him. Not only will you be moved by his images, but you’ll come to like what you garner about him, personally. His gentle evocations are an amazingly powerful juxtaposition to some of the more sensationalist SA photographers. No wonder he and Jo Ractliffe are such good friends….
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Scoring Gold
I first visited David Goldblatt’Äôs most recent works, shown at the Goodman Gallery, a few weeks ago. Being a photographer myself, I have known his works since I can remember. He started off in the fifties as being a documentary photographer but his work was soon appropriated by the fine art community as ’Äòmore than a document’Äô.
In her book Regarding the pain of others, Susan Sontag makes the statement that ’Äòeven to the extent that it is a trace (not a construction made out of disparate photogaphic traces), cannot be simply a transparency of something that happened. It is always the image that someone chose; to photograph is to frame is to exclude’Äô. In Golblatt’Äôs latest works, one feels this exclusion acutely. Not because he excludes essential information, but because he actively uses exclusion of the human form to critically highlight human existence.
With a retrospective in the Johannesburg Art Gallery, spanning practically the whole of downstairs, as well as recent works exhibited in the Goodman gallery, we are living in ’ÄòGoldblatt times’Äô. And rightly so. For information overload, visit the retrospective. If you are looking for pathos, irony, as well as sharply critical commentary on South African society all embodied into empty landscapes, don’Äôt miss the last few days of the Goodman Gallery Recent Works exhibition.
The Intersections series, especially the road between Joh’Äôburg and Cape Town (in the ’Äòtime of Aids’Äô), plays havoc with one’Äôs emotions. I believe that no-one who is living in our country currently can be left unmoved by these works. See it for yourself. You will not be disappointed.