This thesis centres on the debates informing the progress of three public art galleries in South Africa between 1990 and 1994. This was a period of great change in the country, spanning from the unbanning of left-wing political parties and Nelson Mandela’s release from prison, to the first democratic elections which resulted in his inauguration as President of South Africa. The study focuses specifically on the Johannesburg Art Gallery, the South African National Gallery, and the Durban Art Gallery, delineating the events and exhibitions held, the programmes initiated, and the artists represented by these galleries during this post-apartheid/pre-democracy phase of the country’s history. The debates relevant to these galleries linked to those prevalent in the arts, museology, and politics at the time. Many contemporary South African artists called attention to apartheid oppression and human rights abuses during the 1980s. After 1990, with these pressures alleviating, there was a stage of uncertainty as to the role, responsibility, and focus of visual art in a post-‘struggle’ context, however there was also an unprecedented upswing in interest and investment in it. On a practical level, the administration of the arts was being re-evaluated and contested by both independent and politically-aligned arts groups. Public art museums and sponsored art competitions and exhibitions made increasing efforts to be ‘representative’ of South Africans of all races, cultures, creeds, sexes and genders. The many conferences, committees, and conventions created during this transitional era focused on the creation of policies that would assist in nation-building; historical and cultural redress and regeneration; and the education and representation of previously disadvantaged groups. This coincided with a revolution in museological discourses internationally, from the theorization of a museum as a place of commemoration and conservation, to a forum for discussion and revision between both academic and non-academic communities. With the sharing of the process of constructing history and knowledge, came the challenging dynamics involved in the representation of identity and history. In all of these groups - the arts, museology, and South African politics - the predominant issue seemed to be a negotiation between the bid to open up control to more parties, and the reluctance of some parties to relinquish control. While the emphasis is on significant changes that were implemented in the transitional period, the study locates the changes at the Johannesburg Art Gallery, the South African National Gallery and the Durban Art Gallery within their historical, geographical, and socio-political context. Various artists working in these locations during this era are also discussed, as the changes in their status, and the progressions in their subject matter, materials, and concerns are interesting to examine more nuanced definitions of the ‘political’, probing the politics of identity, sexuality, gender, race, geography, and belief systems. Some artists also focused specifically on post-apartheid preoccupations with territory, trauma, conflict, memory and freedom. This kind of artwork was assiduously acquired during the early ‘90s by public art galleries, whose exhibitions and collecting focus and policies were undergoing considerable revision and redress. This thesis examines these changes in light of their socio-political contexts, as well as in light of shifting national and international imperatives and conceptions of museums and museum practice.

Thesis (PhD (Visual Arts))--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / In this thesis I deconstruct key concepts, terminologies, and rhetorical conventions employed in white South African writing on modern black art. I trace the genealogy of the dominant discursive practices of the apartheid era to the cultural discourses of the colonial era, which in turn had their origins in the Enlightenment. This genealogical tracing aims to demonstrate that South African art writing of the 20th century partook of a tradition of Western writing that was primarily intent upon producing the Western subject as a rational Enlightenment agent via the debased objectification of the colonial Other. In the process of the deconstruction, I identify the most significant discursive shifts that occurred from the 1930’s, when the first publications emerged, to the 1990’s, when South Africa’s new political dispensation opened up a different cultural landscape.

This thesis is structured around an exploration of the global phenomenon hip-hop. It considers how its far-reaching effects, as a cultural export from the United States,have influenced cultural production in South Africa. The investigation focuses specifically on the work of two visual artists: Zimbabwean born, Johannesburg-based Kudzanai Chiurai, and Cape Town born, Berlin-based Robin Rhode. The introduction familiarises the reader with the two artists and briefly outlines their histories and methods, as well as giving a short history of the development of hip-hop as a subculture from its beginnings in 1970s New York. The first chapter follows this brief introduction to outline some of the parallels, especially concerning race relations, between 1970s America and post-apartheid contemporary South Africa. This comparison aims to highlight similarities that gave rise to the hip-hop phenomenon and which also place South Africa in a prime position to welcome such influences. The second half of the chapter explores how migration theory and issues of diaspora have not only influenced the development of hip-hop, but have also become points of focus for both artists, who are in fact disporans themselves. The second chapter explores ‘ground level’ concerns of everyday life in the city. Issues of crime,gangsterism, politics and activism are characterised as focal elements of Chiurai’s and Rhode’s artwork and also of hip-hop musical content. Inner city contexts in different parts of the globe are compared through a discussion of the art and music that come out of them. This comparison of the philosophical and conceptual content of the art and music is extended, in Chapter three, into a comparison of methods of production, considering how these influence various readings of the artistic output, whether musical or visual. Ideas of authenticity are discussed and finally the focus shifts to explore how both the conceptual and practical concerns of musicians and artists are being shaped by an increasingly ‘globalized’ world. The conclusion explores the challenges that globalization poses to cultural practitioners and seeks to highlight some of the artists’ methods as examples with which to facilitate the growth of a more inclusive global aesthetic.

D. Tech. (Department of Visual Arts and Design: Fine Art, Faculty of Human Sciences), Vaal University of Technology. / Studies on art made by women have been deprived of their place in the history of art, globally, however, within the South African context, white women were placed firmly within the arts while black women were marginalised. This study makes two assertions, that culture was used as a weapon during apartheid in the 1980s, and that black women, as artists, contributed to South African art history through conferences and exhibitions. The process adopted in securing these two stated positions was to use the frameworks of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and grounded theory as methods to elicit personal experiences through interviews with six women involved in the arts and who contributed to the apartheid struggle during the 1980s. The process used to structure the research and collect data, was an argumentative review of selective literature. Exhibition reviews, conference presentations and proceedings, as well as journal publications between 1982 and 1990. The review concentrated on ‘what’ and ‘how’ statements made on black artists, specifically black women, to understand the reasons for the neglecting of black women artists in the construction of South African art history in the 1980s. Culture as a weapon of the struggle constructed a substantial part of this research as the study considered aspects that constituted struggle culture during the 1980s and the role of black women within this culture. Important to the role of black women as cultural activists was the inclusion of the oppressive nature of class, gender and race as experienced by black women during apartheid to expose the complexities that impacted black women’s roles as activists. A discussion of conferences, and festivals (with accompanying exhibitions), and the cultural boycott against South Africa, the official adoption of culture as a weapon of the struggle, and the resolutions taken at these conferences is investigated. Also of importance was the inclusion of women as a point of discussion at these conferences: their poor position in society, and support for the inclusion of more women into the visual arts. In support of black women’s contribution to South African art history, a discussion on black women as cultural activists is included. This includes interviews with six activists who were part of the liberation struggle during the 1980s who shared their experiences. The study asserts that black artists, specifically black women artists, were prejudiced during the 1980s. This did not however serve as a deterrent to their contribution to a South African art history. Anti-apartheid movements such as the African National Congress (ANC) and the anti-apartheid movement (AABN), Amsterdam, played an integral role in creating alternative cultural platforms that supported a ‘people’s culture’, that enabled the use of culture as a ‘weapon of the struggle’ against apartheid.

This dissertation investigates the correlation between semiotic theory and the way that gendered subjectivity is represented in contemporary South African art. The phenomenon of signification is central to the semiotic theories of the Bulgarian semiotician and psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva. Semiotics can be described as the science of the sign that considers the way in which artists express their personal experience in art making. In this investigation I refer mainly to women's artworks, although the concept of gendered subjectivity in the work of male artists is also discussed. This particular research investigates the symbolic relations of culture in gender terms, that explores the apparent contradictions of subjectivity inherent in capitalist patriarchal society. / Art History, Visual Arts & Music / M.A. (Visual Arts)

This is a monograph on the South African artist Diek Grobler. The aim is to contextualise the artist‟s oeuvre up to 2009 and to explore the visual metaphors in his art. Grobler has a fascination for stories. He blends tales of traditional Western mythology, African mythology, Christian religion, folklore and magical realism into narrative artworks. Through visual metaphors the artist comments on the everyday human dramas that surround him – be they political, social, psychological or cultural. Furthermore, he adds an element of surprise to his sketches of human drama, by infusing them with irony and humour. My research reflects the diverse nature of Grobler‟s oeuvre as it investigates works from various artistic genres such as painting, sculpture, illustration, performance art, avant-garde theatre and animation. It also examines a blend of different artistic media such as ceramics, oil paint, gouache, pastels, scraperboard, earthenware, 2D computer animation, puppetry, and stop-motion animation. / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / M.A. (Art History)

This dissertation investigates the correlation between semiotic theory and the way that gendered subjectivity is represented in contemporary South African art. The phenomenon of signification is central to the semiotic theories of the Bulgarian semiotician and psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva. Semiotics can be described as the science of the sign that considers the way in which artists express their personal experience in art making. In this investigation I refer mainly to women's artworks, although the concept of gendered subjectivity in the work of male artists is also discussed. This particular research investigates the symbolic relations of culture in gender terms, that explores the apparent contradictions of subjectivity inherent in capitalist patriarchal society. / Art History, Visual Arts and Music / M.A. (Visual Arts)

This is a monograph on the South African artist Diek Grobler. The aim is to contextualise the artist‟s oeuvre up to 2009 and to explore the visual metaphors in his art. Grobler has a fascination for stories. He blends tales of traditional Western mythology, African mythology, Christian religion, folklore and magical realism into narrative artworks. Through visual metaphors the artist comments on the everyday human dramas that surround him – be they political, social, psychological or cultural. Furthermore, he adds an element of surprise to his sketches of human drama, by infusing them with irony and humour. My research reflects the diverse nature of Grobler‟s oeuvre as it investigates works from various artistic genres such as painting, sculpture, illustration, performance art, avant-garde theatre and animation. It also examines a blend of different artistic media such as ceramics, oil paint, gouache, pastels, scraperboard, earthenware, 2D computer animation, puppetry, and stop-motion animation. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M.A. (Art History)

Various potential modes of interpreting the urban space in the inner city of Pretoria is evaluated in this study with the purpose of expanding discourse around spatial production in the city. Production of meaning through formal and structural means produced a city that served as administrative capital and ideological base for Afrikaners until the arrival of a democracy in 1994. The contemporary urban space is produced by people through everyday life, as theorised by Henry Lefebvre, rather than through formal means such as name changes. This study evaluates the way that identity and belonging is created by referring to everyday life practices, rhythmanalysis and daily activities as performances. Urban space is evaluated from a phenomenological perspective through the eyes of an artist and resident and expressed in an art exhibition. The way artists Julie Mehretu and Franz Ackermann dealt with urban space in their art is also referenced. / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / Master of Visual Arts

Various potential modes of interpreting the urban space in the inner city of Pretoria is evaluated in this study with the purpose of expanding discourse around spatial production in the city. Production of meaning through formal and structural means produced a city that served as administrative capital and ideological base for Afrikaners until the arrival of a democracy in 1994. The contemporary urban space is produced by people through everyday life, as theorised by Henry Lefebvre, rather than through formal means such as name changes. This study evaluates the way that identity and belonging is created by referring to everyday life practices, rhythmanalysis and daily activities as performances. Urban space is evaluated from a phenomenological perspective through the eyes of an artist and resident and expressed in an art exhibition. The way artists Julie Mehretu and Franz Ackermann dealt with urban space in their art is also referenced. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M.A. (Visual Arts)