MAKING ART IN AFRICA: 1960–2010 Edited by Polly Savage, with essays by Robert Loder and John Picton and a Foreword by Sir Anthony Caro December 2014 ĂĈĀƫ4ƫĂąĊƫ))ƫđƫăĀąƫ,#!/ƫ Over 300 colour illustrations . 'ƫđƫĊĈĉġāġĉąĉĂĂġāĆāġĂƫđƫĹąĆċĀĀ MAKING ART IN AFRICA 1960–2010 đƫ Sixty artist interviews ofer unique insights into making art in Africa đƫ *(1 !/ƫ0$!ƫ3+.'ƫ+"ƫ$%#$ġ,.+ü(!ƫ* ƫ(!//!.ġ'*+3*ƫ.0%/0/ƫ".+)ƫ%#!.%Čƫ$*Čƫ Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana and Namibia đƫ Includes over 300 colour illustrations, many published for the first time đƫ Illustrated timelines help to elucidate the book’s fascinating social and political contexts What does it mean to work as an artist in Africa? In Making Art in Africa, 60 of the continent’s leading artists and curators give very diferent answers to this question 0$.+1#$ƫƫ/!.%!/ƫ+"ƫ!40.+. %*.5ƫü./0ġ$* ƫ+))!*0.%!/ċƫ+1/%*#ƫ+*ƫƫ/%*#(!ƫ.03+.'Čƫ !$ƫ+1*0ƫ+*/% !./ƫƫ)+)!*0ƫ+"ƫ.0ġ)'%*#ƫ%*ƫ".%ƫ/%*!ƫāĊćĀċƫ!*/!(5ƫ%((1/0.0! ƫ with paintings, sculptures, prints, installations and archival images, these narratives draw on contemporary events, personal discoveries, and the networks such as Triangle Arts, which have brought artists together. The result is a compelling insight into the diversity +"ƫ!4,!.%!*!/ƫ* ƫ,.+!//!/ƫ+"ƫ.0ġ)'%*#ƫ+*ƫ0$!ƫ+*0%*!*0ƫ 1.%*#ƫ0$%/ƫ,!.%+ ƫ+"ƫ. %(ƫ social and political change. Polly Savage is a writer, curator and Senior Teaching Fellow in History of Art and Archaeology at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. Robert Loderƫƫ$/ƫ$ ƫ/0.+*#ƫ(%*'/ƫ3%0$ƫ".%ƫ/%*!ƫ0$!ƫ)% ġāĊĆĀ/ċƫ!ƫ3/ƫ$%.)*ƫ +"ƫ0$!ƫ */0%010!ƫ+"ƫ+*0!),+..5ƫ.0/ƫ* ƫ+ġ"+1* ! ƫ0$!ƫ.%*#(!ƫ+.'/$+,ƫ3%0$ƫ%.ƫ Anthony Caro which developed into a network of workshops and studio buildings in over twenty countries including Africa, South Asia and the Caribbean. John Picton is Emeritus Professor in African Art at SOAS, University of London. He worked for the Nigerian government’s Department of Antiquities from 1961 to 1970, and for the British Museum from 1970 to 1979. The Voice of Africa: ‘motivation of local ownership provided much of the energy and enthusiasm’ African Voices John Picton 8. Pachipamwe participants, Workshop Locations establishing a more permanent presence with the Cyrene Mission, Zimbabwe, Artists came from far and wide to take part in development of studio buildings. The Bag Factory, 1989. The workshop was John Picton is Emeritus Professor of African Art, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, where he attended by: Bill Ainslie workshops located in sometimes unlikely places. in Newtown, Johannesburg, for example, was taught and wrote from 1979 until 2003 when he retired, according to the rules then in force. He was previously employed by the (South Africa), Berry Bickle (Zimbabwe), Sokari Douglas Originally locations were selected in quite isolated established in 1990 by a group of artists associated British Museum, 1970–79, and by the Department of Antiquities (now the National Commission for Museums and Monuments) of the Federal Government of Nigeria, 1961–70. His research and publication interests have included Yoruba and Edo (Benin) Camp (UK/Nigeria) Antonio areas to help prevent distractions from the outside with the Thupelo workshop. Supported by funds E Costa (Angola), Veryan sculpture, masquerade, textile history and developments in sub-Saharan visual practice since the mid-nineteenth century. Edwards (Botswana), Tapfuma world. The intention was to focus the workshop on the raised by the Triangle Arts Trust, it provides Gutsa (Zimbabwe), Bert Hensteede (Netherlands), interaction between the invited artists and the making exhibition space and studios for 20 artists, and offers Richard Jack (Zimbabwe), of work. However, as the Triangle idea took root, residency programmes that extend the workshop Rashid Jogee (Zimbabwe), David Koloane (South workshops were also established in urban centres. experience. Today, there are similar studio buildings Africa), Adam Madebe Prior to 9/11, for instance, the Triangle workshop in in New York (Triangle), Delhi (Khoj), Dhaka (Britto), (Zimbabwe), Stephen Mogotsi (Botswana), Joram New York took place in the World Trade Center, in Cape Town (Greatmore Studios), Gaborone (Thapong Mariga (Zimbabwe), Bernard introduces a book of the frontispiece to Volume 1 is a drawing of the great Matamera (Zimbabwe), David premises between lets. Centre) and Nairobi (Kuona Trust), co-ordinated This brief essay Ndhlouv (Zimbabwe), Daryl In Africa, the 1998 Ngoma workshop in Uganda internationally by Alessio Antoniolli from the voices, a book of people talking about things they temple to Shango, the Yoruba deity of thunder, a Nero (Zimbabwe), Antonio Ole (Angola), Pat Pearce (UK/ took place in a disused part of a leper hospital on Gasworks Studios in London. have made, material things, works of art, things that temple that is still in Ibadan (ill. 11). Frobenius had Zimbabwe), Helen Sebidi the shores of Lake Victoria, and the 2003 Wasla (South Africa) and Vote Thebe need description and encourage discussion and himself initiated by proxy into one of the Yoruba (Zimbabwe) workshop in Egypt took place in a holiday camp on My Engagement with Africa refection around the circumstances of their making, mystery cults and, given his education, he could the Gulf of Aqaba, opening in the week the Second In 1955 I had left London at the invitation of Gulf War began. In Kenya, the Wasanii workshop Father Trevor Huddleston,1 to work for a month in things that embody particular life experiences. They easily see the parallels with ancient Greece. In many workshops were designed to bring local communities peers from other cultures in a highly charged working extended its programme to running workshops in the Sophiatown, little knowing that Johannesburg would are voices emblematic of an extraordinary diversity ways, his account is both entertaining and respectful, into contact with participating artists so that an situation was something that could not only shape an South Africa, and exposed a richer and morehuge diverse refugee campsTriangle of havenorthern fourished Kenya, there which so are strongly. Thebecome ideas my home10. Yvonne for the D nextroge- Wfveendell years and Lusaka of forms, ideas and practices found across the tropical but then we fnd him attributing Ife’s civilisation to the audience for contemporary work could become artist’s career, but also provide working relationships described here by Rob Burnet (Ch 12). my home for threein her years ‘studio’ after at the that. Rafiki As it happened, landscape. and techniques that are exchanged in the process of workshop, Tanzania, 2001 and southern regions of the African continent wherein lost continent of Atlantis: he had fallen into a trap set engaged in local projects. that would last a lifetime. What is hard to convey is the spirit of these the cargo boat that left from Falmouth took so long artists working together have always been a powerful ‘Africa … humanity and the arts have their origins. by his classical education! So whose ‘voice’ was it in During the 1990s it quite quickly became Of course, the network needed money, and much occasions. The opportunity to make work (over six weeks) to reach Durban that when I arrived apparent that these exchange programmes, by of this was provided by the working group of artists Conclusion uninterrupted stimulusby day-to-day to art-making distractions in Africa. in an open at the Priory of Christ the King in Sophiatown, was never The Voice of Africa? Who was speaking for whom? 1936 1986 way of workshops and residencies, were providing putting together a workshop attracting local funding, No attempt has been made in our book to provideenvironment provedI am to happy be a powerful to have been stimulus.Núcleo able de Arte to de assist Colonia de in Huddleston thisPresident Machel had killed inleft, having been withdrawn by his The Voice of Africa? What Frobenius did not realise, or chose to Moçambique opens in Lourenço unexplained air crash; Joaquim Marques, ofering courses in art Chissano becomes president a signifcant number of artists in mid-career with often in kind. The most expensive item in the no- For artists living in isolated communities inand thedesign Anglican order (The Community of the Resurrection, closed off a surveyM of art-makingAP in AfricaUTO or to assign relative process through Triangle and to introduce someLoja-Galeria of opens in Maputo As I worked on this essay I realised we were in ignore, was that for a hundred years there had been important opportunities. By 2005, 25 years after the frills workshop budgets was often airfares. Funding developing world it was, on occasions, mind-1962 Mirfeld, Yorkshire), who felt his political involvement Mozambique Liberation Front 1989 values to a huge and varied output of work and it is the work that has been brought together duringFrelimo this renounces Marxism– the centenary year of one of the frst authoritative a literate, black intellectual class in cities such as (Frelimo) formed in Tanzania from the rest Leninism frst workshop in New York, some 1,400 artists had for long-distance travel came from the Prince Claus blowing. under Eduardo Mondlane threatened their presence in South Africa. The Museu Nacionale de Arte not surprising that there is little discernable common endeavour to a wider audience through this book.(National Museum of Art) opens accounts of African civilisations, Leo Frobenius’ Lagos, Ibadan, Freetown, Accra and Kumasi, a class attended workshops in Africa. For me, the workshops Fund in the Netherlands, the Ford Foundation and By the end of the 1980s, a growing demand1964 immediatein Maputo task allocated to me by the Mirfeld of the world’ Frelimo begins war of 1 aesthetic in works drawn from across an entire independence and forms 1913 book, The Voice of Africa.