Portfolio-Sept 2021

Bev Butkow embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments 2020 Site-specific installation Bag Factory Artist Studios, Newtown, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Anthea Pokroy, Thekiso Mokhele

Portfolio September 2021

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments. 2020. Site-specific installation © Bev Butkow. Photo: Thekiso Mokhele

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments. 2020. Site-specific installation © Bev Butkow. Photo: Anthea Pokroy

Artist My work is an attempt to pin down something that cannot be pinned down. It makes space for things to feel fragile and ephemeral through the tensions they hold between organisation and chaos.

I love the material and bodily practice of painting, exhilarating in its messy stickiness, yet consciously side-stepped it for many years, avoiding its loaded history. I started weaving to tidy up after I cut up a painting in frustration. But I now weave to explode the category of “painting”, refusing to recognise it’s fine art categorisation. I disrupt the Western genre of painting, viewing painting rather as an innately human activity of creating images with materials and colour that has been practiced in multi-fold forms across the ages, particularly by women in activities like tapestry, weaving, lacemaking. I de-discipline my forms, asserting them as decolonial feminist paintings that reassert and reclaim painting as a deeptechnology beyond the Western canon.

I want my art to be so exhilarating, so intoxicating, that the viewer is mesmerised and all her senses engaged. Through their intense vibrational aliveness, my forms create a real connection with the viewer in a way that can move her. In this space of immersive engagement and wonder, conversations about complex issues can begin, like the space of a white “mature” female artist in South Africa in 2021.

statement I celebrate mundane everyday consumer objects by focusing attention on them, making their smallness and ordinariness monumental and special. I immerse in material intensities and vibrational aliveness through physical and bodily materials that remain in process and in flow, never settling into solid reified form or finding an end point.

My bottom-up research approach is lead intuitively through my body in an unplanned itinerant process, which flows intuitively from its sedimented accumulation of experiences and embodied knowledge. The resultant process is organic, fluid, reflexive, messy and spontaneous. I learn and unlearn, make and unmake, using the gestural rhythms of weaving and painting to un-discipline knowledges and destabilize expectations placed on me through the multiplicity of roles I assume as a woman-mother-wife-artiststudent-global citizen. I turn mundane and everyday gestures and materials into dimensional hybrid free-forms which expand into the world-flows to assert my right to claim space as a woman, as well as to question my responsibility to my space and context.

Expanding dimensionally into space, my eXe (embodied-entanglement forms) get activated as quasi-humans, dispersing into the flow of the world.

These free-flowing autographic moments, which teeter in a fragile equilibrium between holding together and unravelling, hold the tensions of how the worldly femme body relates to space, context and the social and material worlds. These forms construct a meditative entangling around what unbounded and expanded means in relation to bodies, lives, materials, making practices, space. This is a way to deconstruct and recreate new forms of relating and co-existing in our complex contemporary world.

embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments Site-specific installation 2020 Bag Factory Artist Studios, Newtown, Johannesburg. © Bev Butkow. Photos: Anthea Pokroy, Thekiso Mokhele

During Covid lockdown, I worked on a monumental scale, using the layered-memory-filledinner-city grittiness of the Bag Factory Artist Studios, Johannesburg, to create an immersive environment that knotted over 30 eXe into the physical structure of the building. A layering of visual elements hits the eye: mishappen woven hanging forms; a precarious sense of incompleteness; undulating shadows; painted canvases crumpled on the floor as support for sculptural objects; suspended looms fashioned out of disused oil-painting stretchers. These hold in a fragile equilibrium between holding upright and collapsing. The installation space is multisensory––dramatic performative lighting, shadow, movement and a sonic piece highlight experiential moments, engaging the viewer’s senses. eXe are flung around the space with a gravity-defying weightlessness, embodied fragments strewn across the room. They are held in formation by flimsy ribbons, wool, transparent fishing gut and other tangled threads. These supports, extending randomly through the space, use the walls and exposed ceiling rafters as armature, functioning as distributed warp strings that turn the space into a giant dynamic weaving loom.

The site of the Bag Factory Artist Studios is evocative: what was a labour-intensive bag manufacturing factory became a legacy creative institution that vigorously defied apartheid’s racial segregation laws and is now a hub that facilitates creative exchange and actively supports artistic careers.

Layering legacy, echoes, memories, woven marks, materials and relationships, the installation forms an experiential and performative network of social and cultural interactions, forming intricate networks of connectivity and interactions that facilitate a circulation of ideas, of experiences, of relationships.

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments, 2020. Site-specific installation © Bev Butkow. Photo: Anthea Pokroy

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments. 2020. Site-specific installation. © Bev Butkow. Photos: Bev Butkow, Anthea Pokroy

Site-specific installation embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments Technical specifications

Material list includes: beads, pearls, string, dishcloths, scrap dressmaking fabric, metal stoppers, plastic mesh, copper wire, repurposed painting stretcher, wool, wooden beads, repurposed canvas, fabric, ribbon, fabric cord, lawnmower cord, baking twine, hessian, acrylic, silver/copper/gold/bronze leaf, insulation tape, cable ties, metal washers, plastic cord, oil paint, ink, encaustic wax, graphite, glitter, embodied traces of time/labour/exertion/conversation/instruction The installation comprises approximately 31-33 artworks, including: • 7 paintings (2 stretched on looms, 5 unstretched) • 7 framed weaves (4 left on repurposed painting stretcher looms, 3 post-fitted/made-to-purpose frames) • 6 free-form suspended woven forms • 1 self-standing sculptural assemblage • 1 weave tower, comprising around 10-12 framed weaves, all on repurposed painting stretcher looms It embodies approximately 5.5 years of combined work: • Bev - 3 years (ongoing) • Marguerite Sanders – 1.5 years • Pinky Moyo – 1 year

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangledembodiments. 2020. Site-specific installation. © Bev Butkow. Photo: Anthea Pokroy

Detail. embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments, 2020. Site-specific installation. © Bev Butkow. Photos: Thekiso Mokhele, Bev Butkow

embodied-entanglements/ Film embodied-entanglements is a languid mesmerizing 6-minute short film that invites the viewer to engage intimately with the threads, knots and entangled details of woven surfaces.

It pans slowly and very deliberately, in extreme close-up, over different surfaces, drawing attention to their minute details, different weaving techniques and materials used. Immersed in the tactile qualities of lighting, the tiniest movement brings undulating shadows.

Accompanying the detailed visuals and bonding the different woven strands together is the deep resonance of a gong, which feels meditative when experienced together with the slow panning and the deep dramatic lighting.

Darkness emphasizes select moments of dramatic lighting, a multiplicity of tiny jewel-coloured beads and threads, giving a deeply mesmeric, layered luminosity.

At some point the harmony of the sound seems to unravel, fragmenting into highpitched strands that hold too long and morph into something unsettling, slightly off.

The ebullient celebration is touched with something, a sadness maybe. An absence. Only at the end does the piece reveal how these details fit together, showing a distance shot of the forms and objects that make it up.

Mental questions form through savouring each moment of deep-looking: what were the hands doing as they made that surface, around their dexterity.

There is a poignancy attached to the absence of the figure of the artist––the body of the artist is implicated, raising questions of who made the works, how did the artist weave this surface, what is the artist doing in the space?

entangled-embodiments Piece Shadows add layered residues of creative process, evoking the sense of human presence. Intricate shadows heightens the interplay between the absent and invisible and the imagined presence.

This film-piece highlights a disembodiment which can be seen to hold the ghostly autographic presence of the makers in the studio.

The invisibility of much female labour through structures of work is made present.

Labour casts its shadow.

2020 6 minutes 12 seconds film footage Nidaa Husain shooting format digital Link: https://vimeo.com/44491554

Screenings: FilmFreeway, The First-Time Filmmaker Showcase 2021 Lift-Off New Year Extravaganza 2021 Darkest Before Dawn: Art in a Time of Uncertainty, Ethan Cohen KuBe, New York 2020 Tactile Visions–Woven, Curated by Prof Sharlene Kahn, Turbine Art Fair, Johannesburg 2020

Claiming my space embodied-entanglements/entangled-embodiments installation Wool, string, rope, cord, ribbon, embodied traces of time/labour/exertion/conversation/instruction on wooden painting stretcher. Oil paint and fabric on canvas 2020 2m x 2m x 3m © Bev Butkow. Photo: Anthea Pokroy

Free-form Site-specific installation

Free-form Site-specific installation 2021 P72 Project Space, Parkhurst, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Thys Dullaart

My sculptural weave towers went zig-zagging through the streets of Joburg (including running out of petrol), weaving a network of connections with their social environment before being thrown into the P72 project space.

Once installed, the semi-sculptural stacked layered constellated weaves exist (temporarily) as evocative bodilylike presences in a conversation with the spatial characteristics of the space.

Dramatic lighting activated them to undo any possibilities of confinement.

Free-form Site-specific installation 2021 P72 Project Space, Parkhurst, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Thys Dullaart

Weave Tower Site-specific installation 2021 P72 Project Space, Parkhurst, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Thys Dullaart

Shadow-play Shadow installation Site-specific installation 2021 P72 Project Space, Parkhurst, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Anthea Pokroy The space is transformed by the projection of light through the screens, into something possibly otherworldy. The permeabilty and porosity of their broken woven surfaces make this possible. Projection of light transforms the sculptural forms variously into projector, screen and receptive surface.

This projection temporarily imprints the pattern of the weave onto the wall…. leaving its shadowed presence. In so doing, it imprints the many hours of hard labour, tiny gestures of weaving, my layered life experiences and those of the women who weave them with me.

Shadow-play Site-specific installation 2021 P72 Project Space, Parkhurst, Johannesburg © Bev Butkow. Photos: Anthea Pokroy

In relation to its space Co-made with Thandiswa Maxinyane.

Weave, made of cut up oil painting, dressmaking scraps, wool, ribbon, glass and plastic beads, fishing gut, embodied traces of time/labour/exertion/conversati on/ instruction, clothes hanger 2021 139 x 64 x 10 cm

Challenge the bounds of acceptability Plastic mesh, string, wool, plastic and wooden beads, plastic pearls, repurposed canvas, cable ties, fabric, ribbon, metal washers, insulation tape 2020 Variable size – approx. 140 x 92 x 20 cm

Emerging, disappearing, refusing the Invisibility Cloak I Co-made with Marguerite Sanders Beads, pearls, string, cord, dishcloths, metal stoppers, plastic mesh 2019 Variable size – approx 106 x 92 x 20 cm

An Embodied Labour with Marguerite Visser Sanders 2019 String, repurposed painting stretcher frame, embodied traces of time/ labour/exertion/creative process 120 x 120 cm

A process of mapping tension Acrylic, graphite, ink, fine-liner, gouache, encaustic wax on Fabriano 2020 100 x 140cm

Shadow series

Traces of Labour series Silkscreen Monotype 2019 Series printed with master printer Cloudia Hartwig at Chocolate Ink Studios 100 x 70 cm

Biography

Bev Butkow (b. Johannesburg 1967) started making art in her mid-40s and is now a full-time artist grounded in the seriousness of her responsibility as a maker, communicator and social actor.

Passionate about life-long learning, she is pursuing a Master of Fine Arts at Wits University, Johannesburg on a scholarship from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. To this challenge she brings a diversity of perspectives from her varied life experiences, like corporate and artistic careers, community involvement, academia and role as a mother and wife. Deeply committed to social engagement and education, she co-founded a library in rural Limpopo and works actively on the board and management committee of 11 schools.

Butkow will exhibit at the 2022 Dakar Biennale and has exhibited at 1-54 London, Cape Town & Joburg Art Fairs and Wits Art Museum. Curated exhibitions include Tactile Visions-Woven at Turbine Art Fair, and The Art of Lithography: a collaborative expression of LL Editions at Wits Art Museum, Johannesburg. She is represented by Guns & Rain and her work is housed in local and international collections.

Butkow has presented at numerous academic conferences, participated in academic workshops and is published in the digital journal [...] Ellipses Journal for Creative Research.

Her creative home is the Bag Factory Artist Studios, blocks away from where her grandfather sold eggs at the Fresh Produce Market in the 60s. Inspired by the only city in which she’s lived, Butkow lives with her husband and four children in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Curriculum Vitae

Selected Biennials/Triennals 2022 14th Dak’Art Biennial, titled 'Ndaffa / Forging / Out of the Fire, Dakar, Senegal 2021 Every Woman Biennial, London 2021 “Interwoven Worlds”, ACASA Triennial, Online 2020 Pre-Biennial World Textile Art Online, Santiago, Chile Solo exhibition 2015 m/other, Lizamore & Associates, Johannesburg Selected Art Fairs & group exhibitions 2021 Bag Factory 30 Years: So Far, The Future, FADA Gallery, University of Johannesburg 2020 Darkest Before Dawn: Art in a Time of Uncertainty, Ethan Cohen KuBe, New York 2020 Tactile Visions–Woven, Curater Prof Sharlene Kahn, Turbine Art Fair, Johannesburg 2020, 2016 Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2019 1-54, London 2019 Latitudes Art Fair, Johannesburg 2018 The Art of Lithography: a collaborative expression of LL Editions, Wits Art Museum, Johannesburg 2018, 2017 Joburg Art Fair 2018 Sister Sister, National Arts Festival, Makhanda 2017 AKAA Art Fair, Paris 2016 Thami Mnyele Fine Arts Awards Top 100 exhibition, Kempton Park District Six 50th Commemorative Print Exchange Portfolio Project, District Six Museum, Cape Town

Awards, grants & selections 2021 BodyIQ2021 Symposium, Berlin (forthcoming) 2021 Finalist, Nature/Nurture Competition, Brooklyn, USA 2020 Recipient of Art: An Essential Need, artandaboutafrica 2019 Recipient Andrew W Mellon: Governing Intimacies (GI) Project

scholarship

2019 Narrative Writing for the Humanities, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 2019 African Studies Journal writing retreat 2018 Africa’s top 20 new and exciting talent, Joburg Art Fair 2016 Johannesburg Council Chamber Totem Public Art Competition 2016 Post-Its, Constitution Hill, Johannesburg, Supported by Sokol Foundation, Hayman Foundation, University of California at San Diego, Los Angeles and Davis 2015 Merit Award, SA Taxi Foundation Art Award 2015 Fresh Produce, Turbine Art Fair, Johannesburg 2015 Winner, Assemblage Postcard Project competition Residencies 2020 Nirox Sculpture Park, Cradle of Mankind, South Africa 2019 L’Air Paris Publications 2020 [...] Ellipses Journal for Creative Research. 2020 Special edition Methodologies, Creative Research in the Global South”

“Embodied

Gallery representation Guns & Rain

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Curriculum Vitae - cont Formal education 2018–2021 Candidate Master of Fine Arts, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, under supervisor Dr Jessica Webster 2016–2017 Honours cum laude in Art History, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 1985–1991 B.Com, B.Acc, CA(SA), H.Dip.Tax, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg

Informal education 2020 Drawing meditation with Katherine Bull 2019 Narrative Writing under Dr Matthew Wilhelm-Solomon 2019 Research trip, TextileLab, Tillburg, Netherlands Ongoing Mentorships with: Nina Barnett, MAFA, University of Illinois, Chicago Usha Seejarim, MAFA, Wits University, Johannesburg Kim Lieberman, MAFA, Wits University, Johannesburg 2018 Paper making at Phumani Paper Archive Mill, University of

Contact details bevbutkow@gmail.com +27-83-378-1981 Instragram bevbutkow

Johannesburg

Conference presentations 2021 Organising committee – Virtual Hugs 2021: Creating from precarious edges, Wits University 2019 Material Narratives: Representations of public and private histories in cloth conference, University of Johannesburg 2019 Wits School of Arts Postgraduate Research Showcase, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 2018 Tobetsa: a huddling, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 2016 South African Research Chair in Southern African Art and Visual Culture conference 2016 WiCDS Decolonising Feminism 2016 UNISA School of Arts conference

Selected community involvement Ongoing Established and ongoing support for a children’s library in Ponelopele in Botlokwa, Limpopo 2015–2021 Board, Management Committee member for 11 schools in Johannesburg 2015–2021 Chair, IT Steering Committee for 11 schools in Johannesburg 2020 Artmask for Kindness project 2018–2019 Bag Factory Project Selection Committee 2018 Mentor - David Koloane Painting Award winners 2018 Collaboration - Save the Children South Africa

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