Now and the End

Financial Mail Page 53 -07/10/14 05:47:41 PM Mu s i c 55 The Lumineers Cinema FML i fe 58 The Maze Runner PA I N T I N G Now and the end Is painting as an art form under threat? After visiting two galleries in Cape Town, Ashraf Jamal doesn’t think so here has been much talk about on Church Street in Cape Town. A distinc- the end of painting and the birth tively pop-based hub, WorldArt is home to of new media, and yet painting is the paintings of Khaya Witbooi, Dion Cupido Tthriving. Indeed, of all art forms it and Kilmany-Jo L ive rs a ge . still manages to compel us. What links these artists is their dealer, “There is an inner yearning that painting Charl Bezuidenhout, who recently returned a n swe rs ,” writes the British art critic from a Berlin arts workshop sponsored by Matthew Collings. A practising painter him- the Goethe-Institut. A gallery with a high self, Collings is one of the leading champions turnover, WorldArt caters to a global urban of the form today. “I’m always surprised by market inspired by pop culture. Indulgent the endlessness of painting, its depths, com- when it comes to ephemera, colour, graffiti- pared to the brittle, fast, amusing character inspired brushwork and iconic imagery, the of all that other stuff.” artists and their buyers celebrate currency. The “stuff ”which Collings is dismissing is Unperturbed by provenance — the consen- precisely the art which in these blithe, dis- sual definition of artistic and monetary posable days is assuming enormous traction value — the makers and consumers of these Khaya WitbooI — video, digital and performance art. How- works understand leverage only in the pre- New Apartheid ever, firmly holding on to the value of paint- sent tense. ing, Collings notes that “the type of painting That the pop megastar Beyoncé chose to buy one of C u p i d o’s paintings has certainly I find gripping is the type amplified the populist currency of WorldArt, where you can say, ‘we l l , for what is evident is that its artists are not the paint is everything Dion Cupido so much inspired by a painterly tradition as h e re’, regardless of what U nt i t l e d by an ephemeral pop-driven tradition in the subject matter is or which the remix and the mash-up are the wh a t ’s known about what defining tropes of The Now. was going on in society at Witbooi, inspired by Steve Biko’s call — “I the time.” write what I like” — uses the canvas as a Clearly this is a purist surface for provocation, while Cupido, a hip- stance, for what Collings hop artist turned painter, is inspired by seems to be advocating is grafting his iconic portraits to a distinctively “art for art’s sake”. What urban landscape. is disputable, however, is Liversage, certainly the most luridly whether there has ever colourful painter of the three, situates her been a time when paint- iconic images inside an electrified force- ing could declare its field of vivid drips and lacerations. If Cupi- sovereign detachment d o’s paintings seem to reverberate subtly, from the world. then Liversage’s pulsate noisily. All three In response to this artists, however, represent the distinctive conundrum I decided to facets of a media-driven urban street art. visit local painting exhi- What these works may mean retrospec- bitions. My first stop was tively is difficult to declare. As Collings WorldArt, a niche gallery points out, it’s “the buzz of instant con- October 9 - October 15, 2014 Financial Mail 53 Financial Mail Page 54-55 -07/10/14 05:49:17 PM FM L i fe while sipping a cognac, then the DINING MUSIC that these challenges provided that basing how you feel on art of today seems to be striving them with a greater conviction. album sales sets you up for a for something very different. “You have to develop a sense bad ride. “I think we’re proud of Consider Zander Blom’s Ne w of what you think works and is a few things, like the persever- Pa i n t i n g s at the Stevenson Season to taste Thanks for the failure good for you,” he says. “Other - ance involved in getting here,” Gallery in Cape Town. If the wise you’re sunk.” he says. “Another is that we’re canvases at WorldArt are And then, after 10 years that on Dualtone, a tiny label in the inspired by iconic urban f he wasn’t the lead vocalist mind responds.” But the process Schultz describes as wrought US that put us on the map [and] imagery, then Blom’s paintings Iand guitarist of American of playing and singing allowed with failure and disappointment, that believed in us like we did in — vast empty canvases with folk rock band The Lumi- him to get lost in the music and came overnight success. Their them. They won an award strategically and abstemiously neers, Wesley Schultz believes relax. “It was the only thing I’d “debut” album sold 3m copies recently for best label with five positioned dollops of paint — h e’d probably be working in ever experienced like that,” he and their single “Ho Hey” or fewer employees.” evoke a very different story. psychology in some way. says. “Eventually I was able to (which has had over 100m The Lumineers have gener- In Blom’s works it is the vis- “My father was a psychologist get some confidence with it and YouTube views) became a hit. ated some award buzz of their ceral matter of paint that counts, and I naturally gravitated that fear and anxiety only really “People think this is our first own, receiving nominations for for what he offers us is not paint towards it,” he says. “I was and happens about 10 minutes record but we’ve made a lot of Best New Artist and Best Ameri- as a means through which to still am fascinated by people and before we take the stage.” music, a lot of different styles cana Album at the 2013 Grammy re present the world, but paint in the things we do to cope with Even though the band toured leading up to this, and played a Awards. What was this like? “It ’s and for itself. l i fe ,” he said, in SA on the band’s relentlessly for a few years, ton of shows,” he explains. not really something you under- Owing much to the austerity first tour here. Schultz remembers having no “So I’m thankful for all the stand [because] there are way of high modernism, Blom’s But music captivated him. money. “We ’d sleep on people’s setbacks. The benefit of failure is too many bands and albums out paintings are not triggers for His love began when he was a floors and couches; often people e n o r m o u s .” there to sift through,” Sc hu l t z pop-cultural storytelling but child, learning the words to all who were just at the show that Schultz is also thankful for s ay s . marooned reflections on the end the songs his father played on night and offered us a place to several memorable experiences Though the band was one of Zander Blom of painting itself. Stripped of the car stereo, and everything he s t ay ,” he recalls. “If we had The Lumineers have had as a a handful of artists asked to per- U nt i t l e d depth — other than the depth of heard on the radio. At 16, he money, we’d buy some groceries band. “We got to play Red Rocks form on the show that night, paint-as-matter — they are, after began playing the guitar. “As and make sandwiches on our [Amphitheatre] in Colorado with they didn’t win. Best New Artist temporaneity that turns us on, Collings, “deliberately shallow Planet Restaurant at the soon as I began playing, I began laps in the minivan.” the Colorado Symphony went to indie pop band Fun and or that we believe turns us on, and trivial”, a means through Belmond Mount Nelson Hotel writing songs of my own,” he Schultz remembers believing Orchestra, which was a magical Best Americana Album went to like drugs turn on people who which to explain how, quite lit- Best Restaurant in 2013 explains. “They weren’t good in what they were doing, even n i g h t .” Schultz recalls. “Th e re Bonnie Raitt’s Sl i p s t re a m . But have something that makes erally, we have painted our- songs, but that didn’t matter.” when others didn’t. “We ’d go on was [also] one show where the Schultz doesn’t seem fazed. them anxious which they want selves into a corner. Because, if Though Schultz and band co- a month-long tour around the power went out in this small “Two-time Grammy losers, The to avoid.” C o l l i n g s’ remark is a we are to stick with Collings, founder Jeremiah Fraites (drums country, and return to our jobs, venue. We ended up just Lu m i n e e rs ,” he jokes. “Has a provocative one, forcing us to then what Blom is doing is fter just one year in SA rant (Cape Town); G ra n d e and percussion) grew up in the bussing tables, and be [sort of] unplugging our instruments and nice ring to it.” ask ourselves what we choose to showing us “in a spirit of black ARestaurant Week — Octo - Provence ( Fra n s c h h o e k ) ; the same town, they didn’t really laughed at,” he says.

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