“A living legacy”, curated by Bongi Bengu and Nathi Gumede

Exhibition title: “a living legacy”
Exhibition venue: Kizo Art Gallery (Upstairs Gallery)
Exhibition launch date: 1 September 2008 at 6:30P.M.
Exhibition closes: 30 September 2008
Artist names: Sam Nhlengethwa, David Koloane, Pat Mautloa, Helen Sebidi, Dinkies Sithole, Nontobeko Ntombela, Johan Thom, Colbert Mashile, Themba Shibase, Sharlene Khan, Sifiso KaMkame, Gabi Nkosi, Esther Mahlangu and others

A living legacy is the biggest and significant curated heritage exhibition in KZN. The exhibition is part of a larger heritage festival under the hospices of Kizo Art Gallery with a title “Umgido, KZN Heritage festival”.

The exhibition intends to investigate the legacy and the contribution of experienced artists (deceased or alive) as to how this legacy moulds the practice today. Art as in many other industries here in South Africa is not immune to the history of this country and the project will look at the link between the practices then and how it influences the industry today.

Are artist today able to create art without the need to reference history of South Africa, i.e. apartheid and its legacy?

KZN as a province has contributed greatly to the creative industry of South Africa and an exhibition like this is appropriate for Durban as it will also investigate how many of the more established artists are still practicing in Durban and what legacy they are leaving behind.

For more information contact:
Bongi Bengu
Tel: 0826770634
Fax: (011) 8386791
Email: bongibengu@gmail.com

Residency Artists Presentation on Wednesday at 4:30pm

The Bag Factory invites you to an informal presentation by the current artists in residence at the Bag Factory.

Hans Wilschut (Netherlands), Ndikhumbule Ngquinambi (Cape Town) and Sita Moyo (Durban) will be offering brief presentations of their careers as artists and their current projects, after which they will be free to answer your questions in an informal session with coffee and muffins.

The presentations will commence at 4:30pm on Wednesday 20 August (tomorrow afternoon).

The Bag Factory Artists’ Studios
10 Mahlatini Street, Fordsburg, Johannesburg
Tel: (011) 834 9181
Fax: (011) 838-6791

Email: info@bagfactoryart.org.za

Happy Dhlame: VIOLENTLY HAPPY

Happy Dhlame invites you and your friends for the opening at Maps (Harrie's Pancake) the 23rd August at 3pm.

Map-South Africa-Pretoria Happy Dhlame VIOLENTLY HAPPY

Opening Reception:15h00 Saturday 23 August 2008

Destination: Harrie's Pancakes, Eastwood Village, Corner Eastwood & Pretorius Street, Arcadia, Pretoria

T: +27 12 342 3613

Hours: Mon-Sun 9am­9pm

Dinkies Sithole: Shrine Rituals

Bag Factory Artist at the Nando's Project Room # 2

Opens: Tuesday 5 August 2008 at 6:30 pm
Closes: Sunday 13 October 2008

Dinkies Sithole is the second artist in he current incarnation of the project room now appropriately called the Nando's Project Room. Sithole is a Soweto-born artist whose work traverses painting, sculpture, performance, video and other media.

The current installation is called Shrine Rituals and comprises a series of shrines made out of discarded materials. The objects in these shrines are re-invested with energy and potency. Here the scientific conception of energy meets the more universal idea of energy as something more metaphysical. For instance, many people in South Africa don't discarding their personal affects for fear that these objects might be used to bewitch the owner. Similarly different belief systems such as Yoruba cosmology where every object has a 'life force' or "ase".

In these shrines the batteries, which are products of science, are not out of place with the miniature Buddha's, rosaries, bottles of 'umuthi' and the coloured string, often used by ZCC adherents for protection.

Sithole works bring together different beliefs both old and new, belief in science and in spirits, religion and animism. But is that not the beauty of art: that it allows for the reconciliation of these seemingly antagonistic beliefs?

Joachim Schonfeldt: Documentary Stills

Opening: Saturday 8 September 2007 at 14:00

Preview by Appointment

Exhibition of paintings on wooden panels Art on Paper Gallery 44 Stanley Avenue, Braamfontein Werf (Milpark), Johannesburg, 2092 Phone: +27 (0)11 726 2234 Fax: +27 (0)11 482 7995 Hours: Tuesday – Saturday 10am – 5pm Exhibition Closes 29 September 2007

Johan Thom: The Theory of Flight

THE BAG FACTORY

Invites you to

The Theory of Flight,
a solo exhibition by Johan Thom

Opening: Wednesday 18 July 2007 at 17h30

Dates: 18 July – 8 August 2007

Venue: The Bag Factory (Fordsburg Artists Studios),
10 Mahlatini Street,
Fordsburg, Johannesburg

Contact: +27 11 834 9181
info@bagfactoryart.org.za

High resolution images available on request.

Related links:
http://www.youtube.com/thomjohan
http://www.art.co.za/johanthom
http://kaganof.com/kagablog/category/contributors/johan-thom/

Africa Remix Artists Visit The Bag

On the 24^th of June Africa Remix, the exhibition curated by Simon Njami, opened at Johannesburg Art Gallery. The show features 137 art works by 85 artists from over 25 countries on the African continent and it’s diaspora. The show was first exhibited in 2004 at the Museum Kunst Palast, in Dusseldorf in Germany, and was considered to be the largest exhibition of contemporary African art ever seen in Europe. The exhibition then toured to the Hayward Gallery in London, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo and the Moderna Museet in Stockholm.

The Johannesburg opening is the first time this exhibition has been shown on African soil.

As part of the opening week’s celebrations a number of the exhibiting artists who were in town and staff from the Johannesburg Art Gallery joined the Bag Factory artists for drinks, dinner and a small exhibition of recent works by the Bag Factory artists.

The Exhibition is on at the JAG until the 30^th September and a number of talks and linked events will take place during this time for more information on these please visit the Africa Remix Johannesburg site: http://www.africaremixjoburg.com/

Exhibitions: Sam Nhlengethwa and Andrew Tshabangu

Andrew Tshabangu - City in Transition

Bag Factory artists Sam Nhlengethwa and Andrew Tshabangu both open exhibitions this month.

Nhlengethwa will exhibit solo work as well as collaborations in conjunction with Robert Hodgins at art on paper. The exhibition entitled Double Jeopardy will open this Saturday, 9 June 2007 at 13h00. The exhibition closes on 30 June 2007.

Tshabangu's exhibition, City in Transition, opens Thursday 14 June @18h30 at Gallery MOMO.
The exhibition closes 7 July 2007.

Athi-Patra Ruga @ Michael Stevenson

Bag Factory artist Athi-Patra Ruga opens his first gallery exhibition in the side gallery at Michael Stevenson in Cape Town this evening. The show entitled She's Dancing for the Rain with her Hand in the Toaster features an installation of suspended garments designed by Ruga, and will be complemented by Scenes from Miss Congo, a multi-channel video work shot on location in Kinshasa, DRC, during a recent residency (part of the final instalment of Die Naai Masjien Trilogy).

Ruga and his team, consisting of performance partner Christopher Martin, actress Simanga Humphrey and personal assistant/production designer Bianca Nobanda will present a performance at the opening tonight, Monday 4 June from 6pm to 8pm.

Exhibition closes 7 July 2007.
www.iqons.com/athi-patra

Michael Stevenson
Hill House
De Smidt Street (off Somerset Road),
Green Point,
Cape Town,

Paul Emmanuel: The Lost Men, Mozambique

PRESS RELEASE

THE LOST MEN MOÇAMBIQUE – a memorial installation

Issued by: Les Cohn of Art Source South Africa

The Lost Men Moçambique (TLM) - a poignant site specific, outdoor
memorial installation by artist Paul Emmanuel, will be installed in the
public space of the Catembe ferry jetty from the 24th April 2007.

It will be on this site for three weeks. This delicate and ephemeral work,
with images printed on transparent voile, dialogues with memory
around losses both private and collective,related to the various conflicts
leading towards Moçambican independence.

The Lost Men Project was launched to public and media acclaim
at the 2004 National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, South Africa. This
is the only time this work was seen in South Africa.

Paul Emmanuel states, “This work is an expression of my personal
experience as someone who has knowledge of mourning and
memory.The delicate, fragile presence of the work situated in a
‘landscape’ which,in Maputo, is a liminal space of departure and
arrival, provides the viewer with a particular context to contemplate
the images, and their relationship with this specific site. In this
instance, the Catembe Jetty”.

Les Cohn of Art Source South Africa and TLM project manager says, “
This innovative project has taken three years of sensitive negotiation
and development to bring it to fruition. Art Source is proud to present
this exquisite work to the public of Maputo.”

An official opening event, together with a small exhibition of prints –
products from workshops to be conducted at the National School of
the Visual Arts, Maputo – will be held at the French Cultural Centre
Mozambique,
Av. Samora Machel 468, Maputo at 6.30pm on Saturday 28^th April 2007.