This study investigates the multiple occurrence of violent sacrificial imagery associated with animalistic and hunted bodies in the work of selected South African female artists as an articulation of the society in which the art was created. The theoretical framework of corporeal feminism is applied with reference to the postulations of George Bataille (1962), René Girard (1972) as well as Deleuze and Guattari (1984,1987), specifically with regard to the notion of becoming animal. This study shows how such imagery is used to act as a catalyst for social change by challenging Cartesian dualisms and forefronts certain issues applicable to women in a society that is patriarchal and violent. A comparison is made with the art of a selected group of Australian female artists who deal with similar themes and imagery from more or less the same timeframe. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / tm2015 / Visual Arts / MA / Unrestricted

This dissertation analyzes the South African musical, King Kong, and its resounding impact on South African society throughout the latter half of the twentieth century. A “jazz opera” based on the life of a local African boxer (and not the overgrown gorilla from American cinema), King Kong featured an African composer and all-black cast, including many of the most prominent local musicians and singers of the era. The rest of the play’s management, including director, music director, lyricist, writer and choreographer, were overwhelmingly white South Africans. This inter-racial collaboration was truly groundbreaking in a nation where apartheid was officially enacted a little over a decade prior to King Kong’s 1959 debut. Relatively apolitical in its message, King Kong proved accessible to South African audiences regardless of race or background, and became overwhelmingly lauded as an endeavor that all of the country could enjoy and cherish. The musical successfully toured South Africa’s major metropolises, often to sold-out crowds. Its domestic success later spurred a tour of Britain in 1961, making it the first major South African theatrical production to be staged abroad. Due to the multi-racial efforts behind King Kong, its success and the high quality of its performers, the musical initiated a new era in South African music and theatre for decades to come. Despite being based around King Kong, this dissertation contextualizes the production, as it uses King Kong’s creation, development and legacies to further analyze larger themes within South African and global histories. Each chapter, as a result, examines the evolution of the musical from the life story of the boxer from which the play is based, the musical’s making and tour of South Africa, the play’s 1961 tour of the United Kingdom, the experiences of the black casts in exile, and the failure of the play’s 1979 remake. By examining the play, its cast, and their collective legacies both in South Africa and further afield, this project complicates our understanding of the Black Atlantic framework by infusing Africans as active participants in these transnational discussions. / text

This dissertation analyzes the South African musical, King Kong, and its resounding impact on South African society throughout the latter half of the twentieth century. A “jazz opera” based on the life of a local African boxer (and not the overgrown gorilla from American cinema), King Kong featured an African composer and all-black cast, including many of the most prominent local musicians and singers of the era. The rest of the play’s management, including director, music director, lyricist, writer and choreographer, were overwhelmingly white South Africans. This inter-racial collaboration was truly groundbreaking in a nation where apartheid was officially enacted a little over a decade prior to King Kong’s 1959 debut. Relatively apolitical in its message, King Kong proved accessible to South African audiences regardless of race or background, and became overwhelmingly lauded as an endeavor that all of the country could enjoy and cherish. The musical successfully toured South Africa’s major metropolises, often to sold-out crowds. Its domestic success later spurred a tour of Britain in 1961, making it the first major South African theatrical production to be staged abroad. Due to the multi-racial efforts behind King Kong, its success and the high quality of its performers, the musical initiated a new era in South African music and theatre for decades to come. Despite being based around King Kong, this dissertation contextualizes the production, as it uses King Kong’s creation, development and legacies to further analyze larger themes within South African and global histories. Each chapter, as a result, examines the evolution of the musical from the life story of the boxer from which the play is based, the musical’s making and tour of South Africa, the play’s 1961 tour of the United Kingdom, the experiences of the black casts in exile, and the failure of the play’s 1979 remake. By examining the play, its cast, and their collective legacies both in South Africa and further afield, this project complicates our understanding of the Black Atlantic framework by infusing Africans as active participants in these transnational discussions.

Unmasking the heroes: sources of power in Afrikaner mythologising is a personal, visual and theoretical exploration of the underlying sources of power which governed the development of Afrikaner nationalism, particularly the years spanning the late 1980s and the early 1990s. The practical work, a series of drawings and relief cut-outs, sets out to unmask the beliefs, customs, traditions and attitudes particular to Afrikaner culture. It does so through the processes of deconstruction and reconstruction of selected mass mediated images whereby different symbolic paradigms are juxtaposed through the devices of collage and allegory to uncover layers of meaning. This art-making approach was informed by theoretical and visual research into the tradition of Western mythology, including related topics such as linguistics, psychology and sociology, Afrikaner history and historiography, and the mechanisms of contemporary cultural reproduction, particularly the South African mass media and fine arts. / History of Art and Fine Arts / M.A. (History of Art and Fine Arts)

Unmasking the heroes: sources of power in Afrikaner mythologising is a personal, visual and theoretical exploration of the underlying sources of power which governed the development of Afrikaner nationalism, particularly the years spanning the late 1980s and the early 1990s. The practical work, a series of drawings and relief cut-outs, sets out to unmask the beliefs, customs, traditions and attitudes particular to Afrikaner culture. It does so through the processes of deconstruction and reconstruction of selected mass mediated images whereby different symbolic paradigms are juxtaposed through the devices of collage and allegory to uncover layers of meaning. This art-making approach was informed by theoretical and visual research into the tradition of Western mythology, including related topics such as linguistics, psychology and sociology, Afrikaner history and historiography, and the mechanisms of contemporary cultural reproduction, particularly the South African mass media and fine arts. / History of Art and Fine Arts / M.A. (History of Art and Fine Arts)