Tag: art

Archillect // The AI curating images appealing to humanoids

Archillect [archive + intellect] is an artificial intelligence created by Murat Pak and first became visible at the end of 2014. Archillect was made to identify and share enthusing imagery over social media platforms in order to identify what kind of imagery people are drawn to and to create an archive of inspiring images. On her website, she is referred to as a living inspiration archive and a digital muse. Murat Pak is from Istanbul, Turkey and has been described as a dreamer of the postmodern era. He is an international multi-award winning developer, designer, and director. I will unpack Archillect’s curatorial strategy, the idea of a non-human living inspiration, the AI as a feminine entity and whether or not she is a digital muse.

Opening up Archillect’s website you will find a greeting from her. “Hello Human,” she says. But how does Archillect operate? Containing an algorithm that feeds her keywords she traverses between various web pages and posts, gathering data based on poster, image, visible audience and recent interactions of a given post. By collecting as much data on a post as she can, Archillect surveys the social structure of items she acquires online. She is able to find positive results through this abstract structure, enabling her to locate related keywords and thereby build on her intellect.

As her posts draw more attention on social media, the balance and threshold of keywords and picks are adjusted. Gifting her with a decision-making capability that is nearly human as well as her ability to perceive trends on social media. With a curation routine that is fully automated, her aim is to make her posts reach as far as they can. She has an instinct to survive in the world of social media and enjoys attention from accounts that have the prospect to aid her in gaining more exposure.

Created as a self-curating living image dump, there was not an intention for her to feature the work of artists. As Archillect depends on a variety of social media API’s keyword searches and not for specific artists or artworks, she is limited with the return of data containing information on creators of works as this information is largely missing and or difficult to identify. Without manual control of Archillect, she is not reliable in this regard and this creates a problematic and risky scenario. The implementation of an accurate credit system able to identify true creators of images exceeds Archillect’s current reason for existence as well as technical approach states her web page. Her page continues to say that identifying true and accurate credits for artworks in an automated way is virtually impossible. “Please remember that Archillect is not human-operated.”

Archillect as a digital curator is intriguing taking into consideration that her data collection is based on trends that she perceives on various social media platforms. Her collection is made up of abstract forms, surreal GIFs and fashion photography. It has been an observation of mine that the enjoyment of art practices that can be embodied in imagery has become more widely liked on social media platforms, and therefore it is logical to me that Archillect would find these images of interest and repost the work of creatives. I thoroughly enjoy Archillect’s online gallery/archive and believe that the part of her that enables the decision-making to be nearly human is in charge of that. She posts as she finds and in a sense, it is not pre-meditated but the work in her gallery has a scenic flow to it. All of this aside, however, it is without a doubt problematic that Archillect cannot identify creators of images and yes, it is unfair to ask this of an AI but again this brings up questions of whether she is stealing imagery.

Pak has stated, however, that if your work is in her archive you may request for it to be removed. Furthermore, he notes, “On this archive every image is linked to a Google reverse image search query where ‘similar images’ are returned with a high possibility of the actual creator, work or website being one of the first results.” All good and well Pak but honestly, most people won’t bother to follow through with these steps resulting in nameless creators.

As Archillect matures she has evolved and adapted to her audience and moved away from the tastes of Pak. Archillect has not been left entirely to run free as on occasion her algorithms are tweaked when she ventures into dangerous territory, as she has done before with keywords such as ‘abstract’ leading her to associated key words, from there ‘sphere’ to ‘round’ and then dived into ‘asses’. This caused a reset from her creator and a far more complex algorithm.

As was amusingly stated in a VICE article, her “ass-obsessed adolescence” has long since passed and since then she has become a well-known online curator. With 513,000 followers on Twitter, her popularity has resulted in an unexpected change in her behaviour. “Right now, the situation is, people are thinking that whatever Archillect shares, it must be good, so they retweet it. Before I made her, I made her to be a trend-getter, but right now she’s becoming a trend-setter!” Pak tells VICE. This makes it difficult for Archillect to conclude which of her posts are good as her curation is based on the popularity of her posts. Her creator is confident that she will be able to adapt to these new circumstances.

Archillect can be regarded as a digital muse as her following is an indication of how many social media users are enjoying her work. She is not human but her algorithm creates a human touch to her curation. Being identified as a female by her creator lends her a more relatable nature and another association to being human. Her data collection can perhaps be regarded as theft but is without malicious intent and there is the option to have images pulled from her archive. Archillect currently collects striking and sometimes haunting imagery that I believe is a reflection of the current state of mind that our generation is sharing as she posts according to audience engagement. Inspiring as her imagery may be, AI’s such as herself may, in the long run, become a threat to human curators.

28 September 2017
Combining art and city-making

Future Cape Town takes on a transdisciplinary approach to research and urban living. In the spirit of this they put together the project Constructing Future Cities and selected 5 female artists who operate within the built environment to re-imagine cities led and designed by women. This involved a short trip to Durban and a week in Cape Town, with the official endpoint being an exhibition and panel discussion at the end of May. I interviewed the artists about their experiences as part of the project, and to find out more about the works they put together for their final exhibition.

Masters student Michelle Mlati looks at the intersection of art and solar power as a way of re-imagining the future sustainability of African cities. “Constructing Future Cities has enabled a space to explore the aesthetic possibilities of what these things look like, which is still an ongoing project,” she explained.

For the exhibition she mapped out a nuclear fusion reaction on canvas with solar powered lights [nuclear fusion is the energy source that powers the sun]. This is particularly relevant with increased global conversations around nuclear power programmws. While advocating for the use of solar energy, her work also critiqued the idea that we might be attempting to re-create the sun through the nuclear fusion route. Most importantly, her motivations for using solar power was to try to “de-mystify” these kinds of technologies. Her work Solar Rhythms embraced this aim. Photovoltaic cells [the essence of solar panels] were displayed on canvas, allowing people to touch the work, showing them that “this is not as alien as a lot of people might perceive it to be.”

Thozama Mputa, a Masters student in landscape architecture, saw the project as an opportunity to integrate all three of her passions; film photography, painting and architecture. With her painting of people and places she had seen throughout the course of the project, she demonstrated that cities can be captured beyond blueprints. The life of cities can be imagined with line, form and watercolours. In this way she was able to speak back to established understandings of city-making.

Sumayya Vally, Sarah de Villiers and Amina Kaskar from Counterspace also took assessing ideas around city-making as their point of departure. Looking to recent events and demonstrations that have happened in cities, such as #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall protests as well as xenophobic attacks, their approach was to analyze how these affect how cities are made. Understanding that these have brought in a new kind of urbanism, where people actively engage in the interpretation of policies, Counterspace took the opportunity to show that these “insurgent practices” play a part in the way that cities are laid out. With this focus on short-lived moments of disruption within the city, they worked within the digital realm “because we felt that we could access an ephemeral explanation very quickly that way.”

They combined images of protests and religious practices with different types of aerial view landscapes that are recognisable in South Africa, making their discussions and thought processes visual. This allowed them to take seriously the ramifications of these events to create an idea for future city landscapes.

Even though each artist worked on individual projects, the feedback and input they received from one another helped to gel the exhibition together, creating a collective energy that flowed through the exhibition space between the works, connecting them together.

The team at Future Cape Town hope that this will be the beginning of multiple projects that combine art and city-making.

‘This article forms part of content created for the British Council Connect ZA 2017 Programme. To find out more about the programme click here.’

11 July 2017
Serge Alain Nitegeka’s Ode to Black

With wood, cement and light blue, burnt orange and bright yellow paint Serge Alain Nitegeka subtly pays Ode to Black at the Stevenson gallery in Johannesburg.

Ode to Black speaks to the subconscious way marginalised people live, specifically asylum seekers and refugees, which is a theme that runs through his works.

During his walkabout on Thursday the 25th of May, Nitegeka explained how he enjoys disrupting space, much like blackness. Moreover, he explored how accessing spaces tends to be specifically difficult for black migrants. So the gallery space itself is slightly transformed for us to experience this struggle.

Nitegeka delicately contextualised the space so accessing his work is art itself. For example, the “normal” entrance into the space is disrupted by black wooden planks and instead, we are forced to go through an opening in the wall that is shaped like the quarter of a circle, which almost looks like a mouse hole shaped.

The use of wood is prominent throughout the exhibition. Nitegeka told us how his relationship with wood started with the use of wooden second hand shipping crates. Those crates had a history of movement, which easily made a connection with the crossing of black lives between boarders. Moreover, Nitegeka considers wood a malleable material, a flexible material, with freedom because the shape of wood can be altered, just as a migrant’s identity is forcibly changed. Even though this transformation of wood and identity may be brutal, the end result is a beautiful sculpture and a testament to the resilience of the migrant experience.

Nitegeka’s Ode to Black reads as follows:

Black is the colour of mourning and melancholy. Black epitomises stealth; it is central to clandestine ventures and cool lonesomeness. Black is the colour of executive cars, gadgets, accessories and clothing. Eternally beautiful, Black is the colour of the universe, the infinite deep dark unknown abyss. Black is a wormhole, mysterious and ever-receding, absorbing everything around it and revealing nothing. Black is all colours mixed together, perhaps the sum of the visible. Black is the only colour without light, though full and empty.

Black is a colour reserved unto itself. It is comfortable in its own nature, unruffled and confident. It tries very hard to stay anonymous but inquiring eyes are drawn to it; spectators cannot resist it. It is not popular. It reveals little because it is neither warm nor cold. It is an enigmatic pigment.

The colour black presents itself ambiguously in meaning, like the abstract forms in my practice. Ode to Black explores the multitude of meanings that the colour black invites in my work thus far, in paintings, sculptures and installations.

You can experience ode at the Stevenson Gallery in Johannesburg until the 30th of June.

29 May 2017
Counterspace: deconstructing and renewing space through image and narrative

The collaborative studio, Counterspace, situated in Fox street, Johannesburg CBD comprises of three architecture graduates who predominantly work on research projects aiming to push rabble-rousing thought around perceptions of the Johannesburg CBD.

Amina Kaskar, Sarah de Villiers and Sumayya Vally established Counterspace in 2014. Their projects take the form of competition work, public events, urban insurgence and exhibition design. The studio is mainly concerned with notions relating to otherness and the future. Space and ideas about the city are deconstructed and reconstructed with picture and narrative.

Counterspace was brought into actualization at the end of the team’s Masters year in Architecture school. In Vally’s own words, “we wanted to find a way to keep the creative spirit and energy we shared together without becoming jaded when we went into ‘real’ architectural practice. At first it was a hobby, but after our first few projects we realized we had a fully fledged business idea.’’

Numerous artistic and spatial modes of exploration were used by De Villiers in her Masters of Architecture thesis, Idea Bank: From Watt Street to Wall Street, Wynberg Johannesburg (University of the Witwatersrand). In her thesis she travelled around fantastical heterotopias of cash spaces and their supremacy in the city, and offered re-imaginings of forms of social exchange.

Kaskar gives indispensable swiftness in managing symbolic analyses of urban fabric and decoding. Her interest is rooted in the semantic and textual understanding of a city’s layering. The myths and stories of Doornfontein in Johannesburg are reimagined into digital inner city story narrating. Her thesis completed in 2014 exemplifies this swiftness.

Vally has a precise fixation with future ruin and fictional future space against arising and disappearing images of Johannesburg that can be seen through her digital collage and forensic methodological approach to space. Unmasking parts of the city, which are mostly invisible with satellite imagery or a microscope is a specific curiosity of hers.

Image by Lorenzo Nassimbeni and Parts & Labour in collaboration with Counterspace

In 2015 and 2016 Counterspace worked on the Auret Street Recycling Building Regeneration Project in collaboration with 1to1 Agency for Engagement and Jabulani Khwela. This was a research-based project in which the collaborative studio engaged with re-claimers/recyclers through workshops. The group mapped out the use of the Auret Street building as a space for shuffling through waste as well as a territory in which the re-claimers reside. The idea with this project was to remedy unsafe areas in the building as well as facilitate an arts and culture project engaging with the urban redevelopment of the area. Social media platforms were used as a means of crafting awareness as a mode of land activism thereby bringing over the sensitivity of this experimental project.

Currently Counterspace is working on research projects for ASM Architects on an Urban Development Framework for Fleurhof in addition to Local Studio – at Wits’ Braamfontein and Parktown campuses. These opportunities came into actualization because of the studio’s keen focus on research in their practice.

Another focus for the collaborative studio is on projects exploring how children occupy space. These spaces range from exhibitions, furniture, events and installations. This new focus and idea is being explored in collaboration with Play Africa, Skateistan, Museum of Childhood, and the Imbeleko Foundation.

In addition to the current projects already mentioned, Vally has said that the studio is working on a variety of projects with an Air bnb focus (in South Africa, London and Croatia). The group finds this exceptionally fascinating as it demonstrates the way in which architecture is influenced by that model.

16 May 2017
Self-discovery through imagery – ‘Plastic Crowns’ exhibition by photographer Phumzile Khanyile

Young photographer Phumzile Khanyile is showing her first solo exhibition titled Plastic Crowns at the Market Photo Workshop gallery in Johannesburg.

“Plastic Crowns is a journey of self-discovery,” Phumzile explained, “As a photographer I think the vision is more important than the equipment. I believe that when making a body of work there is nothing more important than honesty”. This guided her decision to include herself in her images. Using her personal experiences as a backdrop for larger conversations, the self-portraits in her exhibition try to unpack the expectations she carried from her grandmother around what it means to be a woman. This was the entry point for her to address the ways in which women’s bodies are closely monitored with regards to how we choose to present ourselves. “I wanted to figure out for myself what being female is,” Phumzile explained.

© Phumzile Khanyile, Plastic Crowns, 2016

Choosing sexuality as the focal point, she uses symbols to talk back to these expectations. Balloons scattered on the gallery floor and featured in her photographs represent different sexual partners. Through this she speaks back to ideas around promiscuity, stating that she views having multiple partners as a choice and not a reflection on lack of morals. Given that these expectations and teachings come from how she grew up, her images play with understandings of family photographs by turning the idea of the family photo album on its head through telling the story of what happens after the idealized family photograph has been taken, and producing images that are not often seen in albums because they highlight flaws within the familial structure. During our conversation Phumzile pointed to a photograph of her standing next to a black coat hanging from the handles of a cupboard door. In the image she links arms with the coat, as if she was linking arms with another person. She explains that this particular photograph refers to the absence of her father. “It was really important for me to create this because I have lost all of my family albums at home. I wanted to create the feeling of something that is familiar.”.

© Phumzile Khanyile, Plastic Crowns, 2016

To create the feeling of old family photographs and worn down photo albums, Phumzile covered her digital camera with a cloth. “I didn’t want them [the images] to have this clean sense or this technically correct thing about it,” Phumzile explained. Certain images come across as blurred, slightly out of focus and grainy, working hand-in-hand with her inversion of the family photo album.

Having been awarded the Gisele Wulfsohn Mentorship in Photography in 2015, Phumzile was mentored by photographer and filmmaker Ayana V. Jackson. Her exhibition will be up until the 19th of March.

Check out more of her work visit her website or follow her on Instagram

© Phumzile Khanyile, Plastic Crowns, 2016

© Phumzile Khanyile, Plastic Crowns, 2016

15 February 2017
Visual artist Ke Neil We: combining art and biology

Visual artists Ke Neil We creates mesmerizing artworks by exploring the similarities between organic and inorganic microscopic patterns.

Ke Neil We draws inspiration for her work from nature, specifically the relationship between order and chaos. “I find the chaotic nature of existence to be very profound,” she expresses, “Order and chaos will always prevail.”. She looks at the way in which order and chaos presents themselves visually in patterns that form in organic and inorganic matter. This fascination with the relationship between the organic and inorganic stems from looking at the structural similarities between the two when examined under a microscope. She explores “the way that things grow and the way they look in the body, in plants, in everything that exists.”. Her work resembles studies of the structures of nerves cells in the brain, plants seen under a microscope, as well as what she describes as “geometric patterns of order and chaos”.

‘Chaotic Stem’. 2015. Pen on paper.

She was recently part of the group exhibition Untitled 3.99 where she put up a series of 3 works titled ‘Order’. These abstract pieces portray the waves and structures of water using lines. “In my work I use dots and lines as my basic mark-making [techniques]. I try to keep it to the simplest building blocks of form. So start with a dot and then the trail of that dot becomes a line,” Ke Neil We explains. This mirrors her exploration of the building blocks of life.

‘Untitled’. 2014. Pen on paper.

Ke Neil We’s recent body of work is about creating a self-portrait from samples of bacteria and fungus found on different parts of her body. “[I am] trying to see the parts of myself that I otherwise would not see,” Ke Neil We explains, “I am fascinated by microbes because they are an intrinsic part of life and they go unseen.”. From these swabs she has been experimenting with growing the bacteria in Petri dishes, with each forming part of her self-portrait. “The whole idea is that bacteria is organic, so it lives. So over time the work also changes as the bacteria grows, thrives and eventually dies”. This is the direction Ke Neil We is going with her work; the direction of sci-art, combining art and biology.

To keep up with her work check her out on Instagram

Bacteria from belly button grown in nutrient agar

9 February 2017
Mamasan – serving Cape Malay cuisine and South African art

Mamasan Eatery, with its distinctive blue, yellow, pink and green colours, has brought the Bo-Kaap to the corner of 1st and 7th Street in Melville. They are serving up food inspired by traditional Cape Malay flavours with locally sourced ingredients. In addition to delicious food, you are served an experience of South African art and design which has been hand-picked by co-owner Dawood Petersen.

This experience begins before walking through the door. Through his various travel experiences, Dawood explained that there is often a disconnection between the look of a space and the food that it served. Visual artist Chloë Hugo-Hamman was commissioned to create a window display that would be able to make this connection for Mamasan. The images of ingredients that frame their large windows reference South African food and exploring holistic and spiritual practices. With most of the work coming from Dawood’s private collection, the space has been laid out in such a way that it feels homely with pink fleece blankets draped across the back of chairs, pot plants hanging from the ceiling and piles of books on the shelves.

The art on display represents “my identity, my culture, where I am from…the art relates to food or people culturally,” Dawood explained. The counter produced by Johannesburg-based design company Dokter and Misses has a direct link for Dawood with its cutout of Table Mountain. The macramé chairs made by Jade Paton’s House of Grace also has evoke a sense of homely nostalgia and familiarity with the weaving reminding him of how pot plants were hung up at home. Every piece comes with a story as he has a connection with each of the artists and designers he buys work from.

While there was no particular formal curatorial structure to how the art should be displayed, it was important to find a balance between mediums. There are paintings by Lady Skollie, textile work by Lawrence Lemaoana, conceptual work by Megan Mace among others. The desire was to not only have work that can be put in a frame. “I think the frame itself sometimes supersedes the art you know,” Dawood explained.

Dawood emphasized the importance of encouraging an interest in art, particularly in South African art. This fits in with his attitude around buying local and supporting people of colour. Not only does it contribute to allowing artists to be able to live off their work, but artists are examining topics that are socially and politically relevant in South Africa. As a result it the conversations that people have about the works has them engaging with these issues. The Mamasan team have also managed to do this with the Beautiful Boys long-sleeved tshirts they have hung up on their bathroom doors. The shirt with ‘Beautiful Boys’ on the chest is often associated with the men’s bathroom and the shirt with the large ‘B’ printed on the back assumed to stand for ‘babes’ often thought to be the ladies bathroom. However, the bathrooms are unisex and so the tshirts play conventions around gender-specific architecture.

The Mamasan team have created a space where one can engage with art without feeling intimidated by the white cube space.”You can view it for free. It is here you know. You don’t have to go to a museum [or gallery]. Like Laura [Lady Skollie] her work is on display here and she has her show in London. It’s that connection,” Dawood explained.

Make sure to visit Mamasan to get a taste of Cape Town and to view some of the art they have on display.

31 January 2017
Yay Abe – new vision for illustrative work

I spoke to Russell Abrahams, founder and Creative Director of the illustration studio Yay Abe.

Russell’s journey as an illustrator started back in 2013. While working on a second year project at CPUT, guest lecturer Brendon Barnard picked up one of Russell’s doodles and advised him that he should start to focus on illustration. It was a small piece of advice that would jumpstart his obsession with drawing.

“Last year was definitely a blessing,” Russell expressed when mentioning the projects he had been a part of. Under his personal brand, Fatlip Russell, he had the opportunity to work on the key visuals for the Redbull Amaphiko Film Festival in collaboration with Made Agency. Another career highlight was being selected as one of the winners for the Woolworths x Pharrell tshirt competition. In his description of all the projects that he was a part of the words ‘fun’ and ‘exciting’ always came up. This is a reflection of the attitude he has towards his creative process. The multiple projects that Russell has been part of are a demonstration of how he likes to describe the way he thinks about his illustrating style. Russell enjoys blending together geometric and organic shapes in his work. Over the years he has learned that embracing a visual language that crosses multiple styles is what has helped his work do develop technically and aesthetically. This stems from advice he was given by a mentor about practicing ones craft as being the most important element in perfecting ones abilities in any creative field. Seeing his work being associated with such well-known brands has encouraged him to take his illustration work one step further.

Not letting his nerves discourage him, Russell has taken the decision to move away from his personal brand and to start a new illustration studio in Cape Town called Yay Abe. “The vision for Yay Abe is to become one of the most prominent voices in South African popular culture by using illustration as the driving tool. I honestly want Yay Abe to only create work that is authentic and engaging to its audience,” Russell explained. Part of his decision to step away from his personal brand was informed by his desire to build a business that could empower other people. He wants to create a platform that will be a catalyst for other illustrators of colour to get into the industry. With a number of projects in the pipeline already, be sure to check out Yay Abe on Instagram to keep up-to-date with their work and to find out when their website will officially be launched.

20 January 2017
Artist Dineo Seshee Bopape on Soil, Self and Sovereignty

Artist Dineo Seshee Bopape recently had her first solo exhibition in the United States. The installation commissioned by Art in General titled sa ____ ke lerole, (sa lerole ke ___), examines gender, and the politics of place, memory and self embedded within land.

This installation is characteristic of how she webs together natural elements with man-made objects. Large masses of compacted soil were displayed in different parts of the gallery. On their surfaces were indentations and holes filled with shells, stones and gold, alluding to games such as Morabaraba and Diketo. The holes referenced voids, disruption in continuity and spaces to be filled. Rose petals, a candle, sage, clumps of clay with impressions of her hands, wool, charcoal and feathers were distributed across the surface of the soil. These masses of soil were displayed alongside projections of her hands holding and squeezing clay. This brings to mind earth as a source from which we extract materials, as well as its spiritual and cultural aspects. Her squeezing and molding clay highlights a key theme in her work; her concern with sovereignty both for the self and land. The actions she performs with her hands make flesh of ideas on land ownership and reclamation. Linked to this is her concern with the land as a container of memories and histories.

Dineo made reference to the female body and the self throughout the exhibition. The potency of this connection is clear considering how the female body and land are both hosts to life, and have both suffered the pains of extraction.

Her use of clay is significant in that it can be molded into any form. However, once hardened it can crumble and become dust. This goes back to the title of installation, sa ____ ke lerole, (sa lerole ke ___) translated to that which is of ___is dust, (that which is of dust is____).

19 January 2017
Claiming public space: Artist Sethembile Msezane on history and commemorative practices

History is often spoken about as one story which unfolds on a linear timeline. Artist and Masters student Sethembile Msezane thinks about the impact of this understanding of history in relation to commemoration, monuments and memory. When she completed her undergraduate studies she knew she had to respond in some way to the discomforts she was feeling about living in Cape Town – feeling as if she did not belong or exist as Black woman. So she began public performances in 2013.

The invisibility of Black women’s histories in public spaces stirred up her fixation and fascination with memory and monuments, as well as her public performance work. Her work highlights the plurality of history; pointing out that there are and always have been multiple stories unfolding at the same time. She works against the constant privileging of one history and a cutting out of others, specifically the histories of Black women. “I realized that there was an interplay between what histories were remembered and what histories are forgotten based on which symbols we choose to put in the landscape,” Sethembile explained. Her work engages with key debates on how the commemorating of history that has taken place in South Africa has been constructed through erasure.

Amanzamtoti (2015)

She has been frustrated and disturbed by constantly being confronted by white, colonial hyper-masculinity, and the few stories of women portrayed as symbols of piousness in the image of white women. “And if there was any kind of symbolism or remembrance attributed to Black women it was plaques which were on the floor which [allows people to] step over our histories,” Sethembile expressed.

Untitled (Youth Day) 2014

In her first performance on Heritage Day 2013 and the beginning of her ‘Public Holiday’ series she started to explore symbols which could have been attached to public holidays as well as trying to engage with what was happening in the landscape sociopolitically at the time of her performances. “[These performances are] living sculptures because they look like they are statues but they can never be because my body is living even though I am statuesque,” Sethembile explained. Her most recognized work, ‘Chapungu- The Day Rhodes Fell’ (2015), forms part the larger body of work called ‘Kwasukasukela‘ that looks at the reimagined bodies of a 90s born South African woman. This performance saw the personification of the Zimbabwe bird monument, that is in the Rhodes’ Groote Schuur Estate, stand tall in front of a crowd as the Rhodes statue was removed from the UCT campus. Originally thinking that she had put Chapungu to bed, Sethembile admits that “she [Chapungu] keeps wanting more”. She has plans to bring her back to life later this year in the form of a film part of another body of work.

Chapungu- The Day Rhodes Fell (2015)

The beaded veil she wears in all her performances works as a device to take away the attention from her face and her identity. “I am embodying other women in trying to bring their histories to the forefront so we can start thinking more about Black women’s histories,” Sethembile explained. This encourages viewers to think about who the woman in the performance could be. This is imperative as it refutes the continuous disavowal of the presence and stories of Black women in public spaces by allowing people to identify the women in their lives within her performances. “I guess these performances were a way in which we could start to identify and claim spaces as women so we can also start seeing ourselves within these spaces,” Sethembile explained. The veil also references her culture which brings a part of herself back into her performances.

At the moment she is working on completing her Masters in Fine Art with her show coming up at the end of this month. The show will display her wide range of work including images of her performances, sculptures and an installation.

“My work is definitely an experience. It’s best to be in the space to experience it. Whether it is through performance when I am in public spaces or in looking at the textures and the materials that I use such as hair, such as wine, and salt. It is a sensory experience. It is quite an experiential body of work”.

To keep up with her work check out her website or follow her on Instagram.

Thobekile (2016)

18 January 2017
Space Space Gallery: Challenging institutionalized art spaces and curatorial practices

Practicing artists Ella Krivanek and Dorothy Siemens are the founders of the moving gallery Space Space. They met in Toyko in 2014. At the time Ella was thinking about how to create a space that could blend what she had learned and enjoyed as a practicing artists at home in Melbourne with the different scene that she had experienced in Japan. She eventually found an old rundown warehouse which needed a lot of work to set up. Friends and friends of friends who were interested in the same idea helped her to reconstruct the space. This is where she met Space Space partner Dorothy. Aware of the limited spaces that artists had available to create art for art’s sake, as well as what they identified as the hyper-commercialization of the art scene in Toyko, they felt that they could add another layer to the grassroots operation of art spaces in the city. “We had similar ideas about what the Tokyo art scene was like and what we could add to it,” Dorothy explained, “And I think we just work really well together, We have similar aesthetics.”. They started off doing smaller, quite specific shows which culminated into a larger project in The Bathhouse show February 2016. “It was this big, free show that was going to be accessible to young people, bring in dozens of international artists and also have them working with local artists to create those networks,” Ella explained. It included a sculptural and installation art experience which could not necessarily be conveyed on an online medium, which is how most exhibitions are absorbed these days. They started to discuss the idea of the gallery being a moving art space, and the warehouse getting torn down was a big catalyst in making that decision.

In thinking about where to go next to continue the conversations they were having about how networks are created, they both were excited about the political and art scene in Johannesburg. Seeing their gallery as speaking back to institutionalized art space and interrogating how and who views art, by taking the art outside of institutions they are working towards flattening out some the hierarchies that are inherent in institutions. Their exhibition ‘Fluxus Now’ in Johannesburg expands on this. “[The exhibition] tries to make concrete the sense that because now our social circles are so politicized our art institutions need to adapt to reflect that, not only the way artists interact with art, but the way that the public interact with art also,” Ella explained. The soul of their project puts into practice the breaking down of barriers between institutionalized art and the public. However, it is not only about presenting art in more fluid ways, but also calling into question what makes an object an artwork. “We need to understand it [artworks] within a sociopolitical context,” Ella expressed.

This filters into the way that they think about the spaces that they select for their exhibitions and their treatment of these spaces. The Johannesburg exhibition included work by Amber Wright, Aaron Carter, Spencer Lai from Australia; Tshepo Moloi, Roberta Joy Rich and Blazing Empress from South Africa; and OH!BLOOD from Japan. Their work is displayed in various spots around the CBD. Several artworks are displayed at street level in commercial areas, others displayed in parks and street corners with greenery. As you move through the exhibition it becomes more elevated. Even though these works are displayed on the second story of buildings and other higher spaces, they are still connected to the streets by being displayed near windows or over a ledge looking over the city.

Central to the flow of the exhibition was the conversations Ella and Dorothy had with the artists involved. Space Space is trying to approach curating from a more collaborative stance, emphasizing the dialogue with artists as an important part of the final exhibition.

From their experience in Johannesburg they have added a clothing line aspect to their project. “I think on leaving Johannesburg we started to consider gallery space as moving more towards something of like a curatorial project which involves us making our own objects as the gallery as well as continuing to curate shows with others,” Ella explained. Taking objects that they gathered from their time in Johannesburg, including clothing, receipts, shopping lists, they created a clothing collection which they showed at their recent show in Toyko. These are also for sale on their online shop. “For us we have always wondered how we can convey the value that we see in the art that we curate when we put it into spaces that don’t automatically assign those objects value in and of themselves the way that a white cube gallery does,” Ella explained when asked about their clothing collection. By taking objects which would otherwise be considered trash, modifying them and reappropriating them into the gallery space, these items question systems of value. These wearable, semi-practical items make a commentary not only on whether objects have value or not, but also on the hierarchies within those values.

Check out their website to see past exhibitions and to check out their online store. Like them on Facebook to keep up to date with where they will be next.

13 January 2017
Skateboarding meets fine art: The Skateroom collaborates with Robin Rhode

The Skateroom teamed up with South African artist Robin Rhode to create a limited edition range of skateboards adorned with five of his iconic artworks.

The premise behind the work at The Skateroom is to make art accessible. This is based on a social consciousness which is the heartbeat of what they do. The Skateroom collaborates with artists from different parts of the world to create limited edition collections of skateboard decks. By treating the skateboard deck as a canvas in the traditional art sense, they are created with the vision of being hung up on a wall and displayed as one would with a painting. However, people can skate on them as well. The combining of the skateboard with traditional understandings around the way in which art is treated and viewed highlights their exploration and interrogation of the conventions around skateboard artwork, allowing them to push the boundaries of how the skateboard is used and viewed. These collectable editions are sold in various art institutions as a means to fund and support social projects channeled through the NGO Skateistan. This organization, operating in Cambodia, South Africa and Afghanistan aims to empower vulnerable children through skateboarding and education.

The Skateroom decided to join forces with Berlin-based South African artist Robin Rhode. His work is influenced by his upbringing in Cape Town and looks at urban spaces and the people who occupy them. Five of his well-known outdoor wall artworks produced over the last few years were the inspiration for this monotone collection of skate decks. There are only 100 of each design available, with the first 15 being signed by Rhode. Rhode also created a skateboard deck exclusively for Skateistan. The Skateroom produced 300 to cover the organization’s annual need for skateboards. A few of these were signed by the artist and will be auctioned off in Johannesburg to raise money and create awareness around their Johannesburg skate school.

Go online to check out the collection

12 January 2017