ART OF EVERYDAY THINGS: Africa Contemporary Art Catalogue

ART OF EVERYDAY THINGS

CATALOGUE of works from AFRICACONTEMPORARY.ART

Jaffer Modern Gallery 17 April to 29 May 2021.

VIB HOTEL | 181 MAIN ROAD | GREEN POINT | CAPE TOWN | 8001 www.jaffermodern.com

ART OF EVERYDAY THINGS WHAT:

A group exhibition, incorporating South African artists, working in a range of media from traditional oil and gouache to mosaic and even motorbikes, focusing on unconventional and whimsical usage of the subjects and objects as object d’art, fashion, sculptural installations, and photographs.

THE PARTNERSHIP Kathy Berman of AfricaContemporary.Art (ACA) and MuseumStore.Africa (MSA) has responded to the invitation from the Jaffer Modern team to co-curate and introduce artists and designers that she represents. These include: ARTISTS • Kevin Collins (Ceramics) • Nyambo MasaMara (Photographs, Sculptures)) • Ace (Cephus Nono) of Jeanius Exchange (Jackets - art2wear) • Petrus Sekele (Walking sticks) • Coast and Koi (Shoes) These works are incorporated into a broader exhibition, curated by Sara Khan for Jaffer Modern, including the work of Laylaa Jacobs (prayer mats), Razia Myers (oil on canvas), Hanna Noor Mohamed (gouache), Petra Vonk (sneakers) and Ziyanda Majozi (mosaic) This catalogue includes ACA artists only

17 APRIL - 29 MAY 2021

KEVIN COLLINS

ABOUT KEVIN COLLINS Whimsy, delight. These are the words that spring to mind when confronted with Kevin Collins’ diverse oeuvre of artworks. Classically trained at the Michaelis School of Art, Cape Town, in the late 1970s, under such South African luminaries as Stanley Pinker, Gavin Young, Cecil Skotnes, and Helmut Starke.

Kevin’s work both acknowledges a classical tradition while dwelling in a dream-world of fantasy and wonderment.

Kevin’s career has been as diverse as his media, and has included a highly acclaimed career in advertising as a top creative director. He also spent considerable time as a lecturer, teacher and trainer in advertising, film and visual art, and is a renowned chef who guests at prestigious establishments. Kevin currently juggles his practice as a full-time artist, brand consultant and chef.

His work references classical Western art, culture and mythology, while also channeling his own multilingual global upbringing: Kevin’s family lived in Mauritius, while Kevin and his brother were schooled at a boarding school in Pretoria.

His work ranges from oil on board and canvas to his recent series of unique ceramic fables, myths and memes - and consist of “portrait” studies with birds, cats and interesting totems and symbols.

His ceramic work emerged as experimental pieces which accompanyied a significant exhibition of large-scale canvases in 2019. Kevin has continued producing over lock-down - to acclaim and rapacious acquisition by admirers - for their originality, wit and uplifting messaging.

Specially created for exhibit at Jaffer Modern, Kevin’s latest series of ceramics, continues with the themes of portraiture and whimsical association, and serves as his Cape Town ceramic debut.

ARTIST’S STATEMENT Dream and ‘real life’ often intersect in my universe.

My world is a curious duality in which conforming has always been incredibly difficult. But I am certainly never to be associated with the celebrated myth of the ‘tortured artist’. I paint what I am, which is really a positive, curious and highly personal (but I hope sufficiently universal for anyone to engage) journey. The small items that are embedded in my mind from years ago are still so vivid and vital although present as faded fragments.

To quote Francis Bacon's words of "courting accidents", my application of paint and markmaking is often spontaneous and not particularly well planned - the joy of accidents in material and mark-making is incredibly exciting for me.

Accused of not being able to focus at school, my world has never been one of dogged focus with clear outcomes in mind. Long-term planning is often what I am going to have for dinner. Today, right now, is what inspires me - thus the blank canvas, or lump of clay, is loaded with possibilities at every encounter.

In my painting, I use a rather limited palette of less than 10 colours and would never be able to work without white. White is a crucial colour for me. The glorious pigment of colour come alive when I add white.

My wonderful tutors from Michaelis School of Art in the 70’ - Stanley Pinker, Gavin Young, Cecil Skotness, Helmut Starke - all influence my work and I will be forever grateful for the privilege of having been taught by them.

My art works are so often a series of disassociated elements which weave a story of delight and intrigue. I invite you to dip into the works and see the series of contradictions and juxtaposed fragments of my life, past memories and my sense of being African today.

KEVIN COLLINS 2021

CERAMIC PLATES

CERAMIC PLATES

OIL ON CANVAS

FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE ASPARAGUS Oil on Canvas 120 x 80 cm

OIL ON CANVAS

The work is inspired by one of those very contemporary accidents of auto-correct in a WhatsApp message exchange with a dear friend, Anna, in which I ask her if it is still valid to be painting my own version of the rather romantic notion: Four figures in the Book of Revelations who symbolize the evils to come at the end of the world. The figure representing Conquest rides a white horse; War, a red horse; Famine, a black horse; and Plague, a pale horse. They are often called the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Of course my auto correct would never recognise Apocalypse but rather the more frequently used Asparagus. Well needless to say, Anna was delighted - so I added the asparagus to the painting - and there you have it!

NYAMBO MASAMARA

ABOUT NYAMBO MASA MARA Multi-disciplinary artist, Nyambo Masa Mara is known in the fashion world as highly acclaimed fashion designer, MasaMara. This exhibiton, entitled Beyond Borders, signals his transition from spectacular fashion to a profound visual arts embarkation as the artist, Nyambo Masa Mara. While Masa Mara’s fabric and fashion design draws on the vibrant colours and geometric design sensibility of Africa, his art practice has allowed him to advance his narrative to a powerful Pan-African statement on dislocation and relocation, liminality and resilience - the state of the African nomad / refugee.

Beyond Borders incorporates four photographs and seven mixed-media sculptures, and features a dystopian traveller, journeying through an Apocalyptic space. A surreal attestation to migration and hope, it is a deeply personal evocation, and draws on his own background.

One of 14 children, he was born in Rwanda in 1991. During the 1994 Genocide, his family was forced to flee to the D.R.C, and continued to move between Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi. At the age of 13, he was sent on a solo journey overland by his mother to join his older brother to create a new life in South Africa. He attended High School and College in Cape Town, where he studied business. After a brief stint in finance, he chose to apprentice himself to a tailor and began his career in fashion as Masa Mara.

Masa Mara, the fashion designer has featured in the SAMW July 2020 Spring/Summer show, and as guest designer for the prestigious SunMet 2020 where he dressed Miss South Africa 2019. He is one of four African fashion designers chosen to feature in the African Fashion International week in Johannesburg in May 2021.

Masa Mara designs and prints his own fabric - referencing the kaleidoscopic and ubiquitous signature Ankara wax print of Africa.

The artist first ventured into visual art last year with a submission to the Zeitz MOCAA exhibition, Home is Where the Art Is | Art is Where the Home Is - a sculptural installation entitled REFUGEE | REFUSED, a socio-political commentary on African refugees, at once painful and uplifting. Nyambo Masa Mara’s adopted totemic name as artist is derived from the famed long-horned cattle of Rwanda. His hair has for many years been shaped around his face in a horn-like construction.

BEYOND BORDERS: THE DEBUT EXHIBITION Consisting of four photographs, and seven sculptures - three torsos, a motorbike, and three skulls - BEYOND BORDERS, marks the debut of fashion designer Eli Gold of Masa Mara as visual artist NYAMBO MASA MARA. While NYAMBO MASA MARA was invited by the curators to exhibit his fashion work in line with the theme of the exhibition, his contribution evolved into BEYOND BORDERS and the launch of the artist. Interestingly, not one of his spectacular garments is available for viewing, or purchase on the exhibition, as the artist wants to secure a discreet persona as artist (his career as Masa Mara, the designer continues unabated). Instead, his fashionwear is incorporated into art works – integrated as part of the narrative.

BEYOND BORDERS, is a profound and haunting experience: Set in a post-Apocalyptic space, the 4-part photographic sequence follows the route of a lone traveller, and sometime companion. In this body of work, the journey morphs into an Afro-futurist, potentially dystopian, statement, where the traveller / nomad is placed in an indefinable earth-landscape, cracked and barren, and frozen in narrative with each successive photographic sequence. Drawing on his fashion background, both travellers and objects like the sculptural works - are all encased in MasaMara spectacular digitally rendered brilliant geometric patterned fabric. Here MasaMara’s fabrics and couture - the alluring vestments of fashion - are discarded for a carapace (moulded from MasaMara fabric), a body shield that protects his travellers, and their spiritual totems, from adversity.

The BEYOND BORDERS concept not only engages the Pan-African traveller, depicted in proto-African fabrics and clothing, but is also a spiritual traveller, a space traveller, equipped with protective space helmet and totemic items. The dusty environment not only depicts an antithetically abandoned Homeland but an indefinable and liminal NoMansLand, where quite literally no-one ever belongs.

Ultimately the feeling is one of intense mystery, and an all-too-recognisable future for a world that has lived through a recent pandemic and is enduring the harsh consequences of climactic alteration.

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

PHOTOGRAPHS

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NYAMBO MASAMARA. The Promise.

2021 1/5 Framed Photograph Premium Satin Giclee 594x841 mm

NYAMBO MASAMARA. Umhambi, (the Traveller 1) 2021 1/5 Framed Photograph Premium Satin Giclee 594x841 mm

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NYAMBO MASAMARA. Umhambi, (the Traveller 2). 2021 1/5 Framed Photograph Premium Satin Giclee 594x841 mm

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

PHOTOGRAPHS

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NYAMBO MASAMARA. The Seer. 2021 1/5 Framed Photograph Premium Satin Giclee 594x841 mm

PHOTOGRAPHS The Promise, depicts a lone traveller, clad in a (MasaMara) worksuit, with helmet completely obscuring the face, bent double with the weight of his/her/their undertaking, and baggage. Piercing white-(sun)light breaks through the clouds behind (him), almost pushing the traveller forward, or downward, driving the traveller forward on (his) journey to a new land, filled with promise.

Umhambi, (the Traveller 1), depicts two travellers, and a motorbike, in the red cracked no-mans-land. One is pushing the overladen bike. The other rides it. All characters in the image - human and objects - are covered in the signature fabric / skin / shell, including the baggage and the motorbike.

In Umhambi, (the Traveller 2), one of the travellers sits on a chair in the wasteland, and remonstrates with a relic of another era, a bulbous television set – information, knowledge, depiction -real / unreal… Can the traveller truly discern the reality from myth, hope, promise of a better future? As the artist elaborates: “On the journey, the traveller picks up people, knowledge, information. Good and bad.” The traveller (the young artist?) needs to sift through it, all. Hopefully emerging wiser, rising above adversity, but never free of the pain endured during the adversity.

The final image in the series shows the uniformed traveller unmasked/unhelmeted staring into a mirror. A haunting spectre reflects back at the traveller. This is Maso Yerekwa (The Seer). The artist notes: “Once you take that step (beyond the borders), you get to see your true self – understand who you are and who you are meant to be. Who you see there, might not be the one others want to see, or what you were expecting to see reflected back at you. This is not an easy journey.”

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

INSTALLATION 3 x TORSOS

NYAMBO MASAMARA. Beyond Borders Installation. 2021

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

NYAMBO MASAMARA. 2021 One Eye on Information One Eye in the Soul.

SCULPTURES 3 x TORSOS

NYAMBO MASAMARA. 2021 ‘Mugongo Wahetse Intore’ (‘The back that carried the Chosen One’)

NYAMBO MASAMARA. 2021 ‘Akanyoni katagurutse Ntikamenya Iyo Bweze' (‘The Closer to the Sun I Travelled)

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

SCULPTURE 1 X MOTORBIKE

NYAMBO MASAMARA 2021.

Spirit-Rider.

NYAMBO MASAMARA BEYOND BORDERS

SCULPTURE 1 X MOTORBIKE

NYAMBO MASAMARA 2021 Seed I, II, III

SCULPTURES The first sculpture, entitled The Closer to the Sun I Travelled comes from a Rwandan proverb – Akanyoni katagurutse Ntikamenya Iyo Bweze is a helmeted torso bearing the baggage, and orb-shaped symbols of Hope and Promise, of the Traveller. As the artist explains, with another proverb: ‘The bird that doesn’t fly does not know where the wheat grows’: “Sometimes you go to look for wheat - or a better life, or future and you get there … and it is not as promised.”

With the second torso, the figure is encumbered by the symbols of knowledge, or, more precisely, information. A television set replaces the head. Titled: One eye on Information… One eye in the Soul, it speaks of: “How we can travel around the world without moving but get to stand in shoes of those everywhere – we can see what’s happening in Congo, Sudan… everywhere. But you have to be careful, because what you see is not necessarily what is there.”

The final torso is different in bulk: ‘Mugongo Wahetse Intore’ (‘The back that carried the Chosen one’) is superficially less encumbered. A female torso, it is struck through with spears. A small skull hovers above the figure. “She is”, the artist explains, “the shield protecting the warrior. She bears a calabash on her back (the ‘Chosen One’). “In Rwandan culture, to break the calabash, is to bring bad luck: When it breaks you curse yourself. She is shielding the calabash – the Chosen One. All the spears coming through her. She is not moving. She is standing still, protecting what is being protected.”

And the motorbike: Is the Spirit-Rider – the Driving force of the Spirit. As the artist explains: “This is the travelling spirit that existed - and is still in existence. I wanted to show what happened to the Spirit through the journey; what caused the Spirit to move from place to place. This is all decoded in each of the works.”

The three skulls, Seed I,II,III encapsulate the full circle of life.

PETRUS SEKELE

PETRUS SEKELE lives and works in Limpopo.

His witty figurative walking sticks follow the wood-carving tradition (including walking-sticks) of his forebears from the region.

Petrus, however, adds ironic contemporary iconography rendered in vibrant painted designs.

With a Standard 5, he made his way to Johannesburg and worked for 30 years in an ice-cream factory. When he was retrenched, he made his way back to his roots: woodcarving

COAST & KOI

COAST & KOI

Each pair a unique art work, Coast and Koi draws on African, Moroccan, European and Oriental influences, in these beautifully handcrafted luxury footwear designs, Caryn Wilensky, designer and owner of Coast and Koi, brings a lifetime career in fashion, including 10 years as a fashion buyer in Vancouver to her exquisitely eclectic yet classic footwear. Caryn’s footwear has appeared in such Glamour, Vogue UK, and Vogue Japan, and graced the cover of Ideat magazines, a multi-page feature, shot in Paris by French international photographer Bettina Rheims and styled by Bill Mullen.

COAST & KOI

JEANIUS EXCHANGE

ABOUT JEANIUSXCHANGE ANELE (ACE) NONO BESPOKE STREET ART2WEAR FROM LANGA INSPIRED BY JEAN MICHEL BASQUIAT Born and practising in Langa townships, Ace of Jeanius Exchange / Jeaunisu Platform studied graphic design at CPUT, but has found his metier in up-cycling conventional clothing into original art works.

His fabulous free form street wear is Inspired by Jean Michel Basquiat. Each work is original - a spectacular wearable art item.

For Ace, every item of clothing and found object presents itself as a surface to leave his mark upon.

Deeply committed to his community, Ace works constantly every day and incorporates young township dwellers - and out of work women - into his daily artmaking processes, running workshops for them in art, craft and design.

JEANIUS EXCHANGE

JEANIUS EXCHANGE

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KATHRYN L BERMAN (KATHY) +27 82 808 3712

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KATHRYN L BERMAN (KATHY) +27 82 808 3712