The Biennial is intended to place art in dialogue with the city. The first edition in 2017 took place at a railway compound in Yaba, beginning the Biennial’s intention to become a platform that binds urbanism and contemporary art together. By moving to different historically and architecturally significant buildings in Lagos, the Biennial becomes a…
Africa has been losing boys for generations. From the time of the transatlantic slave trade, successive generations of young men have moved off the continent into the New World: first by force and later searching for opportunities Africa has not been allowed to cultivate for them. These young men have become the black face of…
A Portion is a self-reflective series by Tony Gum. “Pain, fear, rage, loss, darkness and the unknown eventually, reconnecting with, love, hope, light and joy” emerging as a response to her recent experiences. Dualities, themes with a monochromatic tone, scenography and anthropomorphism are modes used to visualize a complex process of inner turmoil, rebellion and…
The opening night, emotionally charged with electric glinting grins that masked the inevitable post-installation exhaustion, was a celebration of a four year endeavor. This year’s graduating class first stepped foot into the academy in 2016 during the midst of the historic #FeesMustFall moment. A time defined by renegotiations of power dynamics and institutional critique achieved…
The starting point for thinking through this show is rust. Quite simply, rust occurs when iron or its alloys (such as steel) corrode. This compound of rust (iron oxide or Fe2O3) is a result of the reaction of oxygen to moisture in the air. The process is slow and once complete renders the steel damaged,…
Steven Cohen’s latest exhibition There’s glitter in my soup! invites audiences into a behind the scenes, post-performance moment. His series of self-portraits, carefully put together with the tape used to remove his make-up, are an instance of relative calm in his three-decade long performance practice. The glitter, the butterfly wings, the eyelashes, imprints of fold…
The majority of the young creatives I have had the pleasure of collaborating with reside, as I do, in an African country. While they come from widely diverse formative and cultural experiences, in many recent works I have recognised a common aspiration: the wish to navigate ideas of identity in the present. Flurina Rothenberger “Visitors”. Photographers…
Abstract: “You said, “Excuse me, am I in the way?” Knowing all the while that you were the way. You had this canny ability to shape an untenable reality, mold it, sing it, reduce it to its manageable, transforming essence, which is a knowing so deep it’s like a secret. In your silence, enforced or…
An unwavering gaze. Leisurely looking. Neon talons punctuate a poised hand. Reclining into the soft embrace of cascading furs. What started from the genesis of a broken heart has developed into a striking body of work. Thinking bout’ you (2019), the first of the series, is in a sense a visual reminder of the artist’s…
Joburg Film Festival was established as an independent platform with a focus on African narratives. Running from 19 – 24 November 2019; the festival acts as a platform to showcase and praise excellence in film both locally and internationally. Brought to the public in collaboration with MultiChoice, handpicked films selected from more than 16 countries…
In her 1979 essay The White Album, Joan Didion begins “we tell ourselves stories in order to live”, but of course long before this (and long after) humans have held the sentiment that stories hold some importance. From Maya Angelou’s “there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you” to Jean Luc…
The ocean is the medium which has facilitated globalisation and cultural exchange, but also colonialism and imperialism. As environmental degradation and global warming continue to damage the oceans, understanding their impacts on human society becomes an urgent matter of survival. Landlocked Johannesburg is far from any ocean. And yet, the tides and flows of the…
