exhibition review Kendell Geers, 1988–2012 Haus der Kunst, Munich February 1–May 12, 2013 reviewed by Nico Anklam and Christian Ganzenberg In 2013, Munich’s Haus der Kunst offered the South African artist Kendell Geers his first comprehensive solo presentation in Germany. Curated by his compatriot Clive Kellner, the exhibition included works from Geers’s very early days up to the more recent period since 1 Installation shot of “Kendell Geers 1988– 2 Kendell Geers the year 2000, when he moved permanently 2012” at Haus der Kunst, Munich, showing (from PostPunkPaganPop (2008) to Brussels. It is not far fetched to say Geers’s top left) After Liberty 2 (1989), After Liberty 3 Installation detail (mirrors, razor mesh); dimen- oeuvre, encompassing a variety of techniques (1989), Title Withheld (June Seventy Six) (1988), sions variable and media, was groundbreaking for concep- and Title Withheld (Kendell Geers) (1968–); cour- Courtesy the artist; Galleria Continua, San tual art in South Africa. tesy the artist. Gimignano / Beijing / Le Moulin; Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg; Stephen Friedman Gal- The exhibition in Munich expanded from all photos shot at Haus der Kunst, Munich, lery, London the staircase to three spacious rooms in the by Maximilian Geuter first-level galleries. As an introduction, Kell- ner and Geers decided to present a selection of originary objects from the artist’s oeuvre: quasi-devotional items, archival photographs, and as well as personal documents. Presented in three large showcases, these objects pro- vided the visitor with a framework to situate Geers’s aesthetics, his formal and conceptual approach. Kellner and Geers launched the show in a quasi-historicizing way by showing memorabilia of performances or specimens and footage from Geers’s life. Among others, the vitrines contained a latex mask with the features of Nelson Mandela, a death certificate of Geers’s grandfather, sociohistorical photo documents, a boyhood snapshot, and identi- fication marks, as well as copies of books by Nietzsche, Rian Malan, Antjie Krog, Isabel Allende, and J.M. Coetzee. This introduction convincingly demonstrated the acute force and immediacy of Geers’s earlier works embed- ded in the liminal phase of dramatic social and political change in South Africa. Furthermore, two widely known works chimed in to this first part of the exhibition: T.W. (CV), 1652–2013 (Fig. 6) emphasized the entanglement between the artist’s identity and his artistic practice. As a starting point for his personal curriculum vitae, Geers went back to the mid-seventeenth century, when the Dutch- man Jan van Ribbeck arrived at the Cape of Good Hope and started the first European settlement in Southern Africa. Throughout the entire show one cannot avoid seeing the VOL. 47, NO. 3 AUTUMN 2014 african arts | 79 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/AFAR_r_00167 by guest on 27 September 2021 140522-001_76-96.indd 79 5/26/14 4:10 PM work entitled Manifest (2007; Fig. 6). Even play Les Mains Salles, and continues with Mal- 3 Kendell Geers though its reference to Bruce Nauman’s Win- colm X’s adaptation in his famous speech at Self Portrait (1995) dow or Wall Sign (1967) was undeniable, Geers the founding rally of the Organization of Afri- Found object broke with the quoted, quasi-optimistic notion can-American Unity (OAAU) in 1965.3 Geers gordonschachatcollection, Johannesburg, cour- of the precursor by putting every visitor on thereby obviously relates his work to the dis- tesy the artist the spot, asking: “What do you believe in?” course of guerilla warfare, more specifically to 4 Kendell Geers When Geers speaks about believing, it is less the urban guerilla fighter. T.W. (Exported) (1993) in a religious or mythical sense, but rather as One found another space in the corner of the Razor wire fence; dimensions variable, H: 300 cm a demand for taking up a position. This asser- first gallery: black tape on the wall and on the tion can be traced in Untitled (ANC, AVF, floor marked the outer edges of an equilateral AWB, CP, DP, IFP, NP, PAC, SACP) (1993–94), cube. Clear nylon strings were suspended from an early performance piece in which the art- the ceiling with white plastic signs attached to works almost as byproducts of Geers’s life, and ist joined every political party existing in them. Their rectangular position corresponded T.W. (CV), 1652–2013, mimicking the ubiqui- South Africa at the time, in order to push the to the front sides of the mimicked cube in the tous artist CVs in the entrance of blockbuster newly acquired democratic freedom of politi- corner. In the center of the two identical signs, shows, documented right away how the artist cal choice to its farthest possible limit and to one saw two stylized depictions of handguns embeds himself and his artistic career in his- demonstrate its absurdity. Does democracy facing each other. Apart from the company’s tory-telling as such. Without much comment, allow one to be a member of the most right- credo—“Your Security—Our Concern”—the Geers made a personal selection of impor- wing Afrikaner organization and the ANC at text embraced the central message, in blue tant—national and global—occurrences from the same time? capitals: “ARMED REACTION.” The signs in the last 450 years and combined these dates Further up the stairway one faced By any Corner Piece (1994; Fig. 5) functioned not only with his own CV. The crucial points in T.W. means necessary (1995), which is a work that in formal terms as the outer boundaries of a (CV) were summed up concisely by the artist only exists in the form of text.2 It related cubic space within the White Cube, but they himself: explicitly to the space around it and at the were imported signs of social demarcation lines same time provoked the visitor. “A bomb has from the outer, non-art context. These signs I was trying to articulate a sense that we are more been hidden, somewhere within this exhibi- were an increasing phenomenon in the 1990s than the sum of our days, that events outside tion, set to explode at a time known to the and are now part of everyday life within a social our control can influence and change us perhaps artist alone.” The text, simply set on a A4 for- group that Geers calls his “community.” This more radically than familial ties. I was trying to mat sheet, opened with a threat of physical community is, in his own words, “paranoid, locate my origins within a particular psychologi- violence. The subsequent paragraphs illus- guilty, white, living behind the electric fence cal, political, philosophical and aesthetic space trated the broader context in which this strat- and fucked up and illegitimate.”4 Geers used the that has nothing to do with my biological parents egy was to be understood. Geers apologized signs as a wall-like, semantic, and physical bar- or cultural heredity.1 in advance for any pain he would inflict by rier. They were markers of an area to which the his act. He did not remain apologetic for long, viewer—through the written interdiction—did Needless to say, it is not by accident that Geers though: already the next sentence claimed that not have access, even though one could see at claims as his birthdate one of the most iconic he had no choice “(...) being as much a victim first glance what was hidden behind the signs. months of the second half of the twentieth of the course of art history and contemporary Here was one fundamental difference between century: May 1968, the month of riots in Paris politics as those who are hurt in the process.” the real social situation and the one encoun- that became notorious for a whole generation The very title By any means necessary has to tered in Corner Piece: the viewer saw through of political thinking and activism. be read in a specific tradition that begins with the walls and into the protection zone itself and Also displayed on the staircase was a neon Jean Paul Sartre, who coined the phrase in his thus into the heart of the cordoned area, which 80 | african arts AUTUMN 2014 VOL. 47, NO. 3 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/AFAR_r_00167 by guest on 27 September 2021 140522-001_76-96.indd 80 5/26/14 4:10 PM 5 Kendell Geers Corner Piece (1994) Situation (security signs and tape); 200 cm x 200 cm x 200xcm Courtesy the Artist 6 Kendell Geers (left) Manifest (2007) Neon; 300 x 270 cm (right) T.W. (CV), 1652–2013 Situation; dimension variable attentively. The profound changes in Geers’s modus operandi can also be understood from a materialistic point of view: Whereas Geers preferred to make use of found objects dur- ing his South African period, as in Selfportrait (1995; Fig. 3), the materials in his recent works have become, rather, aestheticized symbols transformed or generated by the artist, as for example the razor mesh in PostPunkPagan- Pop, the skull from Country of my skull (2010) or the broken glass in Obelisk (2008). Without turned out to be a white, and also metaphori- ever disguising his origins, Geers is appar- Nico Anklam studied Art History and Cul- cally the “white” emptiness of a privileged class. ently looking for somewhat universal forms tural Sciences at London South Bank University, Two of the three main galleries in the exhi- and signs. Humboldt University Berlin and at the Graduate bition represented a specific era in the life of One issue that Kendell Geers—like many Center of the City University of New York.