XXVIIe International workshop of the Frac des Pays de la Loire

artistes : DONNA KUKAMA, PAMELA PHATSIMO SUNSTRUM, THENJIWE NIKI NKOSI, MADEYOULOOK

Residency : september 16 - novembre 17, 2013

exhibition organized in the framework of the Seasons South Africa - France 2012 & 2013, with the support of Comittee of Donators.

The International residency at the FRAC Pionneer in this area, the Frac des Pays de la Loire has initiated international residency since 1984, at l’Abbaye de Fontevraud. The Frac des Pays de la Loire dévelop by this exceptional expérience in France, a support activity witch contribute to support creation in other to enrich our collection in an original way. Place of research, exchange, and production, these residencies are actifs and reactifs. The guest artists offer to the public the refund filtered in this time of energy in a work and its extension in the exhibition, conceived as a dynamic meeting. This year, Laurence Gateau wished to invite for the curatorisim of the residency Nontobeko Ntombela, curator at the Johannesburg Art Gallery.

Nontobeko NTOMBELA

curator of the exhibition :

« The XXVIIe Ateliers Internationaux are an opportunity for the artists to question the exchange notion, particularly through their work. There is a double challenge for the five artists. During the residency at the Frac des Pays de la Loire, I helped them to think upon their new production. The Frac staff assisted them on their work and provide informations on the regional art scene. It is a complete immersion in a frame, a stimulant environment, the South African’s artists can thus be inspired by their environment on their work and creation.

SPECTACULAIRE is a culmination of a two-month process of reflection upon notions of “staging” and “performing” with the intention to create ‘an experienced moment’. It is a display of works that are mainly in-situ productions, in that they are resulting from an intense art making process within a context of a residency. In this context these in-situ productions relate to an experienced moment that is also referred to as «a spectacular moment». It is understood that these works reference a past experience, yet at the same time function as an announcement of an anticipated experience, that may or may not come. The intention of this exhibition is to therefore critique and subvert what constitutes «spectacular» experiences, in what essentially becomes residue of the residency – what is left behind and has passed - yet at the same time act as an ongoing experience and the potential to become a reliveable experience.Whilst artworks on this show explore various different themes, there is a common thread, which has to do with the examination of political histories, architecture, land and nature, and the story-telling of the future. The exhibition is thus not about fixing one particular historical narrative that which is only concerned with a French or a South African history, but rather about creating a fictionalised context where these histories meet and can be reimagined.

Overall, the encompassing concept does not simply become “an acting out” of particular tasks or identities. It is concerned with the reframing of “staging” or “performing” as processes that potentially open up tensions between non-existence and hypervisibility. It thus proposes an experience that is obtainable, yet at the same time ungraspable. It is a non-political exhibition that is about political imaginations that get translated into different contexts.

Process and methodology are important aspects of the show as this speaks back to the notion of exchange. It is about how the residency provides a context and an environment where different histories can be explored and as a result exchanges happen. This environment also allows for a space where artists can experiment and reflect in order to expand on their practices.

The exhibition presents the spectator with contained moments of time travel; a mixing of ideas and translation of experiences. It becomes a space where histories and present moments potentially coexist. From journeys into futures, to trading in the intangible and the negotiation of public space, this exhibition will encapsulate moments that speak to notions of time, space, experience, and beyond.

Donna KUKAMA

The Air-State Urgency
Performance and installation
2013

The Air State Urgency is an estate agency that creates the possibility for private ownership of clouds by individuals. In a world where natural resources such as mines are privatized, where land masses remain colonized, and spring water is bottled and sold, would it not be logical to privately own clouds? Unlike the real estate market, which presents buyers with the risk of repossession, the A.S.U. instead offers fixed prizes, once-off payments, and no risk of local factors such as political unrest and city developments increasing or decreasing cloud value. All products of the A.S.U. are sourced from the hemisphere and are to be purchased honestly and against real money.

For the XXVIIe Ateliers internationaux du Frac, the Air State Urgency will provide buyers with the added experience of potential cloud ownership.

The Air-State Urgency is a follow-up of the Investment Bank of Elsewhere, which promised to secure selected aspects of nature as investments to be collected in 20, 30, or 40 years in the same condition.

Pamela Phatsimo SUNSTRUM

Un-Fathom (Schemata)
Walnut ink and pencil on paper
140cm x 300cm
2013

This work reflects Sunstrum’s ongoing interest in imagining intersections between mythology and science. The panoramic drawing shifts between representational, fantastical, and diagrammatic depictions of a volcanic landscape. It makes references to mythological interpretations of the underworld; geological speculations of the earth’s core; the Hollow Earth Theory; Jules Verne’s Journey to the Centre of the Earth; and 18th century European Romanticist landscape painting. The drawing emerges from Sunstrum’s observation that both mythology and science attempt to construct and deconstruct the same mys-teries-namely: the nature of things, the history of things, the power of things, and the future of things.

Geomance
Wood, glass, mirror, plexiglass, and rotator
Approx. 45cm x 45cm x 141cm
2013

Geomance is a sculptural work that may be read in the context of the drawing, Un-Fathom (Schemata). It references geologic site markers; rock cairns; monumental obelisks; galactic quasars; and divination devices.

Geomance is also a component of IF YOU DO IT RIGHT, a performance work created in collaboration with Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi.

Thenjiwe Niki NKOSI

In Plain Sight (After the Tripode)
2013
oil on canvas
145 x 190 cm

What Is It That You Keep Forgetting (After the Palais De Justice)
2013
oil on canvas 190 x 145 cm

These building ‘portraits’ are part of a larger body of work investigating power and power structures.« While my approach to these new paintings has remained the same - namely that I paint the buildings of the cities that I live in or have visited in an effort to study and sometimes re-imagine the city – there is a new element in the work. The addition of plant life is an experiment with the idea of combining the human-made with the organic, and questioning the “language” that we apply to both the field of architecture and the field of plant ecology. We speak about the migration of plants using the same language that we use to speak about the migrations of people, while the formal “language” of architecture speaks about the historical forces and trends at play in the conception of the buildings around usImplicit in my examination of the structures – architectural, biological, and extending into the social and political – is an interrogation of the invisible forces that have created them. »

MADEYOULOOK

non-monuments programme : revisions edition
2013
X-board and sound
5 X 3,80 X 3,80 m

MADEYOULOOK has appointed itself as a non-monumentscommittee with a mandate to emphasise under-ad-dressed histories through non-monumental monuments. The members of the committee are non-partisan and have no political influence. All non-monuments are predetermined as temporary.

non-monuments have a set of guiding principles (subject to change):
1. A non-monument is composed of a shell structure that resembles familiar monumental forms. This form is reconfigured or subverted in some way.
2. The shell structure should be made out of an impermanent material, and house an internal element that constitutes the ‘real’ monument.
3. The ‘real’ monument is either intangible, fragile or non-monumental. Its manifestation must be ‘malleable’.
4. A non-monument is not specific to a single place, time or event.
5. Non-monuments do not function as originals. They are templates that can be reproduced and changed.

The non-monuments programme commenced in 2012, with the horse edition.This year, the committee has undertaken to erect the revisions edition, 2013. This edition incorporates recordings taken frompredominantly archival materials, that reflect historical revision or are considered contested in meaning. These histories are taken from around the world, from various media and reflect the heterogeneity of how we access, understand and determine historical truths.

The work of MADEYOULOOK often references everyday innovations; such as aspects of inner-city life that find simple solutions to ordinary challenges. Related to this is MADEYOULOOK’s broader interest in art’s relation to what constitutes audiences and concepts of publics. Notions of knowledge production, access and ownership are also central to MADEYOULOOK’s thinking.

MADEYOULOOK is an interdisci-plinary artists’ collaboration made up of Nare Mokgotho and Molemo Moiloa.