The year 2007 is significant for Africa and African artists as “[t]his is the first time a major exhibition of contemporary African art will be held in Africa” (Clive Kellner, curator of the Johannesburg Art Gallery, Africa Remix Exhibition Catalogue 2007:9). Africa Remix, an exhibition of 85 contemporary African artists from all regions of the continent and displaying a variety of skills and styles, provides and overview of contemporary art from Africa and the African diaspora in a single exhibition. Previous exhibitions of contemporary African art, namely Africa Explores (exhibited at New York’s Museum for African Art, 1991) and Seven Stories about African Art (exhibited at London’s Whitechapel Art Gallery, 1995) were never exhibited on the continent. After having toured Düsseldorf, London, Paris, Tokyo and Stockholm, Johannesburg is the last stop for Africa Remix and the only stop in Africa. It is important that Johannesburg managed to host this exhibition, both to show that Africa has the capacity and fortitude to host exhibitions of this scale, and for bringing the art of Africa to Africa. It has taken enormous efforts in fundraising to secure this opportunity. Yet, it also points to the lack of proper exhibition spaces both to host travelling exhibitions of this size and to provide a home for permanent collections of contemporary African art. Africa has long been subject to plundering of her riches: first through outright slavery, then through the exploitation of mineral reserves (often leading to concurrent exploitation of people), and in the contemporary world through the more subtle but potentially no less devastating “harvesting” (supported by the inherently unequal nature of global trade) of intellectual resources, such as items of cultural heritage, indigenous knowledge, and the production of scientists, writers, and artists. Africa needs to take the responsibility for making the most of what we have, here, before exporting it to the rest of the globe. Therefore, for art, there needs to be a gallery to support and exhibit the numerous collections of contemporary African art currently locked in storage. This will allow our art to be housed on the continent of its birth. Furthermore, a gallery such as this will contribute to cultural creation on the continent by the fact of its existence, providing space for and stimulating debate, performance and artistic production. This dissertation will therefore serve as an investigation into the interface between art and architecture. An alternative artspace to exhibit primarily but not exclusively contemporary African art is proposed for the city of Pretoria. The full text of this thesis/dissertation is not available online. Please <a href="mailto:upetd@up.ac.za?subject=UPeTD access required">contact us</a> if you need access. / Dissertation (MArch(Prof))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Architecture / unrestricted

Thesis (Ed.D)--Teachers College, Columbia University, l988. / Typescript; issued also on microfilm. Sponsor: Justin Schorr. Dissertation Committee: George Bond. Bibliography: leaves 223-230.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, History of Art, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Jul 21, 2009). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 69-10, Section: A, page: 3782. Adviser: Patrick R. McNaughton.

Thesis--Stanford University. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 170-183).

M.Tech. / My research investigates whether the notion of a Goddess is still relevant as a metaphor to contemporary feminist art, both globally and within a South African context. My hypothesis is that the debate between the first and second-generation feminists regarding the relevance of the Goddess to feminism is incomplete. Using critical literary analysis I examine the issues surrounding the debate, exemplified through an analysis of artworks by Ana Mendieta and Tracey Rose. A further aim of my research is to raise critical debate as to whether a multifaceted and contradictory Goddess, such as the Hindu goddess Kālī, is more relevant to the diversity of options suggested by both postmodernism and a multicultural South Africa. Evidence and interpretation of such an ambivalent Goddess is sought in the work of South African artists Claudette Schreuders and Diane Victor. Arguments from texts relevant to the artworks are critically examined, augmented in the case of Schreuders by an interview. The presence of an ambivalent Goddess is developed in my practical work through exploratory research. Assemblages of varying materials have been created to suggest a metaphorical Goddess. Discussion of these artworks reveals that both materials and concepts are inextricably linked and are intended to invite multiple interpretations. By exploring the issue of feminism in a South African context and adding to a general body of knowledge on South African artists, my research contributes to the University of Johannesburg’s niche area Visually Embodying Identity in a Postcolonial Environment.

This research project assesses the development, application and use of paper pulp as a medium for the production of three-dimensional figurative sculptures for application in the Phumani Paper Programme. The research was undertaken to assess the use of this medium with a view to finding ways of stimulating job creation, which would support community development. I chose to focus on the Hear Our Voice (HOV) programme because of its limited success in job creation for the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD). The HOV art programme is presented here as a case study, which includes its impact on the 2002 WSSD and links it to the poverty alleviation projects of Phumani Paper. The presentation of the outcomes of the WSSD demonstrate the viability of the study. The participation of all stakeholders on different levels has been incorporated into this research study. Participatory Action Research (PAR) design and methodology is applied to this research project. The research project is divided into two phases: the first, project implementation phase, and the second, research phase. The first phase discusses the involvement of participants in project implementation and the technical aspects of production. Using phase one documentation as a basis, the second phase focuses on the collection of appropriate research data and then on the analysis of this data. In the broad summary of the HOV programme, the challenges and failures of the project faced by disadvantaged communities are highlighted, along with the creative ways in which these challenges were met and, in some cases, continue to be met, by project participants. This research project considers the potential for sustained and sustainable poverty alleviation in the long term through the group participation and the creative use of waste material in order to produce and market good quality paper products. / Ms. K. Berman Dr. G. Mukuka

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This thesis explores how the art world negotiates what contemporary African art means, in the context of the international contemporary art system and in relation to the histories of Western perspectives on Africa. Using conceptual and methodological approaches drawn from cultural geography, it examines the field of contemporary African art, foregrounding the terms of negotiation framing contested geographical imaginations and ideas of Africa. The research considers curatorial practices, exhibitions, art institutions, networks and the wider art infrastructure as an arena in which geographical concepts and categories are formulated, debated and contested in relation to contemporary African art. It draws on interviews with artists, curators, gallerists, collectors and scholars, as well as ethnographic fieldwork conducted in institutions and at art events, to unpick the idea of 'contemporary African art' as a working category and conceptual frame. It reveals tensions running through the field hinging on questions of categorisation, scale and location, the geographical dimensions and implications of which are currently under-explored. The conclusions argue for the importance of geographical awareness in debates around contemporary art from Africa and its shifting position internationally, particularly in the context of globalising trends in the art world and beyond, which engender complex geographies of mobility, identity, belonging and opportunity. The thesis also highlights the relevance of debates around contemporary African art for geographers, proposing new directions in research on art within cultural geography.

In 1979, the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the Standard Bank Investment Corporation came together to form the Standard Bank Foundation Collection of African Tribal Art, the first public collection of its kind in South Africa, which fundamentally re-shaped public and institutional perceptions of black art in the country. Its collection and display, at first in the Gertrude Posel Gallery and then in the Wits Art Museum, formed a canon of African art that represented the artistic identities of a larger continent as well as those of South Africa’s majority black population. Together these formed an explicit political statement. This dissertation traces the evolution of the Standard Bank Collection, examining key developments at critical moments in South Africa’s political history. Divided into two parts that juxtapose the apartheid and post-apartheid periods, the first section begins with the founding of the Standard Bank Collection and its inaugural exhibition, African Tribal Sculpture held in 1979. In Chapter One, a case study considers how Wits placed black South African objects in dialogue with the canonical sculpture from West and Central Africa. Wits thereby authenticated black South African objects as art, both in South Africa itself and within the field of African art history, an action that undermined the apartheid system. Chapter Two offers a second case study that takes on the racially charged climate of late apartheid, situating Wits’ collecting practices in relationship to the collections and exhibitions of other art museums in the country. Wits curators employed and politicized the labels traditional art and transitional art in their classifications of South African objects at a critical juncture in the nation’s political transformation. Part two looks at the post-apartheid period in a single case study. Chapter Three examines the politics present in exhibitions featuring African art in the new Wits Art Museum that addressed themes relevant to popular urban culture – including style, fashion, and adornment – viewed as central to the presentation of post-apartheid black identities. By examining the types of objects Wits collected and the kinds of exhibitions it mounted, this dissertation illuminates how the art museum’s cultural authority represented and grappled with the changing racial politics of the nation.

No description available.