Tel: +27 11 834 9181
Fax: +27 11 838 6791
Email: info@bagfactoryart.org.za
Postal address: PO Box 794 · Newtown · Johannesburg · 2113
Physical address: 10 Mahlatini Street · Fordsburg · Johannesburg · 2001
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Exhibition Highlights
Alterating Conditions – Claudia Stemberger – January 2011
The Bag Factory started the year with a bang with the launch of the Alterating Conditions exhibition which exhibited across the spaces of the Bag Factory and GoetheonMain. Curated by visiting art-historian Claudia Stemberger the exhibition focused on performance and video art in South Africa.
The joint exhibition presented works of Dineo Seshee Bopape, Tegan Bristow, Reshma Chhiba, Steven Cohen, Deadheat (Bettina Malcomess|Dorothee Kreutzfeldt), Hasan and Husain Essop, Gabrielle Goliath, Peter Van Heerden, Gerald Machona, Nomusa Makhubu, Thando Mama, Zen Marie, Molemo Moiloa, Nontobeko Ntombela, Athi-Patra Ruga, Berni Searle, Lerato Shadi, Minnette Vári, Amy-Jo Windt, Nelisiwe Xaba & Mocke J van Veuren.
Stemberger said: ‘The Alterating Conditions exhibition was constituted as a medium-based curatorial approach, not a thematic or chronological one. I was interested in looking inside performance art in South Africa and exhibiting both emerging and established artists who work with the medium or the concept of performance. The show challenged art historical classifications of performance as ephemeral, the notion of a live-event that includes the co-presence of artist and audience on one side, and the institutionalized representation in media such as video or photography on the other side. Alterating Conditions included not only live-performances of life-interventions, but also performance-related art works, such as performances produced for the camera, performative self-staging and performative installations and animations.
‘To be close to artists is essential for curatorship. The “Carte Blanche” of the Bag Factory provided an outside view on contemporary South African art practice. That enables to escape from a “friends and family syndrome” that is sometimes inherent to the art world – which a local curator has to avoid by all means to maintain her/his integrity. For me, coming to South Africa it was essential that I do not project pre-fabricated notions of this hosting country without even being a local.
‘I am quite proud with what the artists and I could achieve with the Alterating Conditions show in Johannesburg. I am pleased that it turned out that the upcoming exhibition catalogue, kindly funded by Goethe-Institute Johannesburg, will be the first publication on performance art from and in South Africa.’
Fietas, Fiesta or Fiasco?: September/October 2009
This exhibition includes the prose and photography of Yusuf Chubb Garda, audio accounts of Ntate Modimokoane and Junior Jacobs, as well as all that went into and came out of creating the artwork commissioned by the The Trinity Session, 26’10 South Architects and Feizel Mamdoo currently going up in the subway between Pageview/Vrededorp and Fordsburg as part of the general upgrade of the area by the Johannesburg Development Agency. The artwork was designed by Rookeya Gardee, Bronwyn Lace and Reg Pakari, and community members made their mark on it on Saturday, 26 September.
Adding Subtractions curated by Daniella Géo: June/July 2009
The residency of Charif Benhelima (Belgium), Paula Delgado (Uruguay) and Emeka Okereke (Nigeria) culminated in a group exhibition curated by Antwerp-based Brazilian independent curator and writer, Daniella Géo. Entitled Adding Subtractions, the show ran at the Bag Factory from 17 June to 10 July and featured work by more than 20 South African artists, garnering several positive reviews.
‘South African visual art shows a noteworthy prevalence of found footage, assemblage, collage, series, sequencing, weaving and sampling,’ wrote Géo. ‘If, on the one hand, these artistic strategies reflect scarce economic resources, on the other, they symbolise the gathering of history’s fragments – whether private or collective. Older and younger generations alike rearrange analog or distinct elements in order to reinforce or subvert a certain reality, thereby creating new socio-political and time-space relations.’
Modern Fabrics exhibition curated by Nontobeko Ntombela: 2008
Exploring notions of identity, aesthetics, human and geographic relationships, Modern Fabrics interrogated the relationship between ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture in the cosmopolitan urban landscape of South Africa. The exhibition was arranged in a symmetrical construction probing dialogues between works of different artists as a way of finding synergies, commonality and contradictions. The exhibition was curated by Nontobeko (Nonto) Ntombela, who is currently employed as the curator of the Art Gallery at the Durban University of Technology. Trained as an artist, in recent years she has worked mainly as a curator and art project manager in Durban.
Theory of Flight: 2007
On 18 July 2007 Bag Factory Artist, Johan Thom opened his solo exhibition The Theory of Flight. The exhibition, which included a video installation and photographic prints, was a documentation of a performance work that Thom originally presented in Bangladesh last year. In conjunction with this solo, Thom ran a two-weekend workshop on performance art consisting of a brief introduction to some seminal performance art works in the history of the medium and a series of practical exercises which culminated in an impromptu day of performance at Johannesburg Art Gallery where the participants each presented a spontaneous performative interaction inspired by works on the Africa Remix show. As a final presentation and to close Thom’s exhibition, the workshop participants presented an evening of new and original performance pieces entitled RE/Action on the August 2007. The workshop participants were Shane De Lange, Candice Hirson, Bronwyn Lace, Malvin Mokhonya, Anthea Moys, Rob Peers, Anthea Pokroy, Mishkaar Roberts, Debbie Rogers, Lerato Shadi and Rat Western.
SAarts Emerging: 2006
In 2006 the Bag Factory hosted an exhibition and series of workshops organised by the website team SAarts Emerging http://saartsemerging.org. The website was started to provide a platform for profiling young emerging artists whose work is often not publicised due to its emerging status. In celebration of nearly a year of activity, the group decided to present a physical manifestation of all those who have been involved.
The series of events included Collecting Digits, a panel discussion, at the Wits School of Digital Arts, comprising gallerist Warren Siebrits, digital artists Franci Cronje and Nathaniel Stern, and Johannesburg Art Gallery director Clive Kellner, who discussed ‘the challenges and obstacles to curating and selling digital art in South Africa’. The main exhibition featured works by Lester Adams, Colleen Alborough, Doung Anwar Jahangeer, Christo Doherty, Shane de Lange, Stephan Erasmus, Ismail Farouk, Simon Gush, Dean Henning and Rike Sitas, Bronwyn Lace, Hannes Olivier, Vaughn Sadie, Nathaniel Stern, Rat Western and Asha Zero.
From Minaar to Mahlatini: 2005
On 23 November 2005, the Bag Factory hosted an exhibition and party to celebrate the renaming of our street from Minaar to Mahlathini in honour of singer Simon ‘Mahlathini’ Nkabinde. Mahlathini shot to stardom with the Mahotella Queens and became known as both ‘the king of the groaners’ and ‘the lion of Soweto’. This art happening, sponsored by the Royal Netherlands Embassy, took its theme from Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens, with dancers dressed in the style of the band and videos playing recordings of the band’s live performances. Filmmaker Sue Steele designed and made the beaded curtain for the entrance and costumes for the five dancers from Moving into Dance, another well-established Newtown arts institution. Stephen Maqashela painted a mural of Mahlatini, which was mounted on the wall opposite our entrance. Joachim Schönfeldt created cages for the dancers… and the renaming of our street did not go unnoticed.
Making Mas: 2004
Marlon Griffith is a Trinidadian artist who specialises in carnivals. When he arrived in South Africa, the Bag Factory approached him with the idea that he and his fellow residents, Sonu Aggarwal and Chander Parkash, both from India, collaborate with local artists and art organisations to put together a small carnival. Two weeks of workshops were held with the Performing Arts Project of the Creative Inner City Initiative (CICI) and the Sevenfontein Cultural Group, on mask- and banner-making, and wire work. Griffith asked a number of the Bag Factory’s permanent artists to paint masks, resulting in original creations by Rookeya Gardee, Verna Jooste, Diana Hyslop, Sam Nhlengethwa, Pat Mautloa, Dominic Tshabangu, and Joachim Schönfeldt. Aggarwal and Parkash worked zealously at their sculpture and, by the time of the carnival, had produced 14 works in wood and paint, and in a joint workshop with Marlon Griffith and the Performing Arts Project of the CICI, helped to produce costumes.
For the final exhibition and carnival, other artists practising in Johannesburg were invited to join the Mas. Artist Christian Alexander Nerf produced a video work based on his Polite Force intervention – an imitation police force which tried to improve the public image of the police in Johannesburg. They politely directed traffic, served drinks, and watched over children. Nathaniel Stern presented an interactive digital installation, Asha Zero provided a booklet that was distributed by the Polite Force. Justice Jimmy Setumane Mokwena played a chainsaw guitar and handed out demo CDs. Johan Thom did a performance piece with a pig’s head in the street. Parkash and Aggerwal participated as a couple on a rickshaw… Neighbourhood bystanders also participated as performers and audience members. In spite of the carnival being held in midwinter, it was a roaring success, involving artists, fire dancers, jugglers, stilt walkers, children, musicians, and dancers…
Je ne veux pas manger tout seul (I don’t want to eat alone): 2003
For this site specific food performance featuring 250 escargots, Francoise Vincent and Elohim Feria, who hail from Paris, but have performed everywhere from Ludwig in Germany to Santa Cruz in Bolivia and Caracas in Venezuela, transformed the gallery space into something between the set of a television cooking show and a gastronomic art laboratory. Chalked onto a big red board were the site-specific details of the event: date, time, place and, above them, hanging rather oddly, was a large aloe. A huge table was laden with grapes, lettuce, baguettes, dips and other tasty accoutrements. In the middle was a small portable oven… As the music took over, the artists began to cook the escargots and the gallery began to hum with the warmth of red wine, and the appetising aromas of garlic, sizzling butter and herbs. “Everybody wants to eat,” declared the duo of conceptual pranksters. “If there are not enough snails there will be salad. And if there’s not enough salad come feast with your eyes.”
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