Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 621

'The garden boy's picture on the wall'

Earlier this year, while I was in Cape Town, I interviewed Emma Bedford, a specialist in painting, watercolours, drawings, prints and sculpture at Strauss and Co., fine art auctioneers based in Cape Town. I asked her about what sort of artwork investors were interested in buying, and what these purchases indicated about South Africa's vision of 'art'. In the imaginary of the 'Captains of Industry' who arrive at auction, ready to compete for a prized piece, what was a valuable piece? What was art, in their eyes?

I met Emma many years back, as a newcomer to Cape Town, when she was Senior Curator and Head of the Curatorial Departments at the Iziko South African Gallery. I had no connections and couldn't do anything to promote artists, artwork or the gallery. I think I had on a $20 red H&M hoodie.

But Bedford didn't care about my wardrobe or my lack of significant connections. She just asked me what I was interested in, and sat down to tea with me, and spoke about her current obsession: Marlene Dumas' portraits (see Intimate Relations, by Marlene Dumas). In a way, I've always seen Bedford as a person with an extraordinary ability to be a 'tastemaker': never pushy, but remarkably directive. Because of her knowledgeability, people are more likely to be persuaded through being educated about work that they may have never before considered, and thus more likely to add to their own understanding of what they might like. They may move towards making more unconventional choices because of her enthusiasm.

Bedford finds that a large percentage of her clients are women: because "women often outlive their partners, and sometimes, their children have left. So we give them advice" as they decide what to do with their estates. Bedford sees everything from private treasures – worth far more in the heart of the owner than what it would bring in the art marketplace – to startling surprises. And out on some private valuation trip in the countryside, there it will be: some unexpected goldmine hanging in a widow's home.

When a piece sells for a high price on auction, art gets "on the newspages and even television programmes, people go crazy; it opens up the art field to a lot of people, even if it does not increase their depth of knowledge."  Bedford explained that a few years back, South Africans invested in European art in order to sell them "when the time came to run." But now, there's a "growing appreciation for South African art." Art remains a  long-term investment: artwork takes about 27 years—a generation—before it appreciates in price and becomes a worthwhile investment. Many people don't want to take the risk of buying what appears (to them) to be bizarre contemporary work that may never find a buyer in the future. Even the work of South African photographers (Guy Tillim, Pieter Hugo, and Zwelethu Mthethwa), sought after in Europe and the US, doesn't do well on the market here. And complex, experimental video work, like that of Berni Searle, in demand by galleries in Europe? Forget it. Too risky for the South African buyer.

She told me a story that helped me navigate my imagination towards the confluence point where aesthetics, masculinity, asset display, and race came together for the South African art investor: there is this photograph of Zwelethu Mthethwa's – a nuanced image of a gardener, crouched among the coiled loops of a hose pipe, green lawn surrounding him. A youngish man bought a print of that photograph from a gallery, and displayed it in his living room. Within a short while after his purchase, he brought it to auction, to be sold. Why? Because his buddies who came to watch rugby soon jostled and teased him: "Hey man, hey! Why you have your garden boy's picture on the wall?"

But Irma Stern's "Gladioli" – a still life of flowers in a vase – went for over R13 million (roughly $2 million), which at that time, was the highest price ever paid for any South African art at auction.

If you have the cash, check out their next auction at Strauss&Co.

'The Truth About Crime'

"In South Africa," anthropologist Jean Comaroff tells us in this lecture, "murder rates are held to be diagnostic of violence run amok, of governance haunted by a past of inequities that no constitutional reform, no right of reconciliation can fully dispel. Especially indicative is the failure of the police to protect the populace, to win the war between crime and punishment that for many has turned the post-colony into a Hobbesian war zone." When this obsessive drama of crime and punishment grips the South African imaginary at all levels, it edges aside older fantasies like 'the rainbow nation', or 'a people born in struggle'. South Africans believe their country to be exceptionally violent, "captured by images of law and disorder (the more dire the better)" but "the public fixation far exceeds the facticity of crime" (more people die of AIDS, traffic accidents or heart disease than of criminal violence — thus making it a very unexceptional society in comparison to countries that share a similar past or transitional conundrum). But audacious crime fascinates, Comaroff argues, as does the figure of the 'diviner-detective' (think: renegade policemen like Jackson Gopane, or Kobus 'Donker' Jonker who combines a fascination for the occult with the ordinary police-work, or the now-disbanded 'super-cops' of the Scorpions) — the 'diviner-detective' who seems to be an embodiment of the paradoxes of law, order, and sovereignty in places where faith in the ability to explain lawlessness is lost, and with it possibly the nature of society itself. Recommended listening, if you like a good dose of anthropology.

Interview with director Oliver Hermanus

By Dylan Valley

This year's edition of The Durban International Film Festival in South Africa was a pure cinematic treat. I attended master classes with Burkina Faso film legend Gaston Kabore and surf film legend Jack McCoy, hung out with some of my favourite filmmakers, and saw some truly great films from around the world. Of these, one of the highlights was the African premiere of 27 year-old South African Oliver Hermanus' latest feature, "Skoonheid" (Beauty.) The film made Cannes history earlier this year: It was the first Afrikaans film to screen at the festival and the first official French/ South African co- production ever. It went on to win the Queer Palm at Cannes and in Durban it won Best South African Feature.

"Skoonheid" (trailer above) tells the story of a middle aged Afrikaner man, Francois van Heerden (superbly played by Deon Lotz) who through painstakingly compartmentalizing his life, suppresses his sexual preference for men. Beneath his Calvinist family man façade lies a deeply unhappy and frustrated man. He engages in secret sexual orgies on a farm with other Afrikaans men who are also hiding their sexual preferences. Some of his peers are plainly in denial: "No gays and no coloureds allowed!" says one of the characters as he chases a member of group members away who had brought a brown skinned gay youth along. However, desperate sex with other suppressed men doesn't seem to bring him any real happiness or even relief. He is in a permanent state of quiet internal conflict. He feels disenfranchised and unsafe in the new South Africa. He is like a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. When he has an encounter with an old friend's  son at a wedding, he is mesmerized by his beauty, and his grip over his life begins to slip. We undergo a journey with him: as Hermanus puts it, "a journey that is conflicted and laced with self loathing." Both terrifying and fascinating, "Skoonheid" is uncharted territory in the South African film terrain. I caught with up Oliver Hermanus in Cape Town to discuss the film.

You won the Queer Palm at Cannes, you just won best South African Film at Durban, and you won the same award for your first film a few years ago, "Shirley Adams" (a moving portrait of a Cape Flats mother caring for her newly disabled son.) People are describing you as the new auteur in South African cinema.

Is there an old auteur? (laughs.)

How do you react to that kind of title?

I think we look for those kinds of titles because in Europe they have those auteurs so we should also have auteurs. I don't think it means anything. I think from my point of view, how I make films, it's not an auteur process because it's collaborative. So I think that's an interesting sign, because South Africans are thinking, "because he's not making what we get from other parts of the world, he's an auteur." But I wouldn't want to argue that what I'm doing is extremely avant garde or the voice of a single being. I feel like the way that I work is very normal, contextually. When I think of auteur, I think of Godard. I think of someone who, regardless of what the movies about, he'll just make it. Some of the movies are terrible and some are good. Consistent work is what makes an auteur. Like Woody Allen; every 16 months he must make something. Even if its trash. I don't think I would do that. I would rather make a film once every three years, in the hope that it will be stronger.

How would you describe the filmmaking landscape in at the moment in South Africa?

I'm very excited by it, I think there is a lot going on, more films, more of an audience, so I think it's the best time to be involved in the industry because we are busy. There are more filmmakers, there's more international attention… I would describe it as being in its teething stage. It's growing.

It's also inspiring to see guys like you coming up, seeing what you're doing.

Although, I feel what I do has more of a European appreciation than a South African appreciation. The expectation from South Africans for what films are about is very limiting. They never assume there are other versions of telling stories, they just assume there is a right and a wrong. Which is a sign of us not being a very advanced film audience.

In that light, how was your first film, "Shirley Adams," received by the South African audience?

It wasn't seen by many South Africans. Women in their 40's liked it because they could identify with the main character. But a lot of people never saw a story told in that way, so they were bogged down by the stylistic conventions in the film. With Skoonheid we tried to so something that wasn't as visually challenging but in terms of content, more challenging.

What are your influences?

It changes from film to film. In "Skoonheid," a big reference for us was Hitchcock. The protagonist is a "negative" character, like in "Psycho." You're with the bad guy, or bad guy sometimes. The cinemascope aspect is also Hitchcock. Our opening scene is Hitchcock, using a zoom and a pan at the same time. For the visual style and colour, it was just everything that wasn't "Shirley Adams"! "Death in Venice" byt Thomas Mann was also an influence. More the book than the film. The film is quite dated.

One of the most interesting things about "Skoonheid" is that as a Coloured or Black director you are telling a White Afrikaner story. Historically in South Africa, it's been the other way around.

We are definitely experiencing the reaction to that. I had two well known South African gay socialites, no names mentioned (laughs); hustled their way into a press screening of the film, and they reacted very badly to it. They called a journalist who I know very well to try and influence her review of the film.  She then referred to me… when I met with her I realized that the biggest problem they had with the film was that I was telling that story. However they had no problem with me making Shirley Adams (in which the lead character is Cape Coloured.) They really appreciated "Shirley Adams" because it was "those people over there." I think ownership over content is a big South African issue.  People want context, they want to know what connects you to the story. The first question I've been getting all week is "where does this story come from? " What that question really means is "are you Afrikaans?"

The lead role was superbly played by Deon Lotz. Did you go through a long process before you decided on him?

It was actually Didier (the French producer) who picked him out, He came and looked at a bunch of pictures and said, "he looks the closest!" We definitely saw a fair share of South African actors. I was convinced by Deon based on his second casting session.

You are aiming Skoonheid at the mainstream Afrikaans market, who are used to consuming teen romcoms and family dramas. How do you think people are going to respond?

Deon Lotz has become such an Afrikaner icon that the fact that he's in it, endorses it in a way, and yet he plays the reason why they may not like it! He's such a familiar face to Afrikaans audiences and they really like him, and they just saw him in this huge theatre production, which five million people went to see. In it he plays a heroic father figure…it couldn't have been a better time for us to release a film with him in it. I love the fact that Deon decided to do this (Skoonheid) and that he did it so well. That's going to disarm a lot of people. If we had someone else, it would have been a lot harder.

"Skoonheid" opens in South Africa this weekend.

For more on the film, visit the film's website.

Follow Oliver on Twitter @OliverHermanus

Chief Boima plays Lincoln Center

He's not just a blogger. This Sunday, August 7, at Lincoln Center DJ Chief Boima, who has been traveling in Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone this summer,  will warm up the crowd–along with Ahficionados–between sets by Iyadede, Spoek Mathambo and Blitz the Ambassador. It's free. If you're in New York City (I'm in Massachusetts till August 14), and this hype video by the organizers doesn't not convince, then there's something wrong with you.

Music Break

Nneka--a AIAC favorite–performing an acoustic version of her song, "Do You Love Me Now?" for the French website, NowPlayingMag.com.

 

Wole Soyinka on Robert Mugabe

Wole Soyinka (except from a speech in June at the New York Public Library) linking Harlem's Father Divine, the Yoruba diety Shango, Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian street vender who set himself on fire thus triggering a people's revolution earlier this year, the now-deposed Laurent Gbagbo, and finally, Robert Mugabe, who is "still riding it out on his own wall, blotting out the horizon for others with his grossly inflated ego."

The full lecture here.

Via Bombastic Elements

Wolye Soyinka on Robert Mugabe

Wole Soyinka (except from a speech in June at the New York Public Library) linking Harlem's Father Divine, the Yoruba diety Shango, Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian street vender who set himself on fire thus triggering a people's revolution earlier this year, the now-deposed Laurent Gbagbo, and finally, Robert Mugabe, who is "still riding it out on his own wall, blotting out the horizon for others with his grossly inflated ego."

The full lecture here.

Via Bombastic Elements

The Mubarak Show

Hosni Mubarak denied all charges of economic corruption, illegal export dealings and murder against him during his first day in court. Mubarak, laid out on a stretcher in a cage in his Cairo courtroom, and his two sons, Alaa and Gamal (each holding a Quran in their hands), are represented by Farid al-Deeb, a lawyer who has spent much of this year maintaining Mubarak's innocence and poor health. This trial is already a spectacle, as indicated in a report by The Guardian's Jack Shenker: "At one point a lawyer demanded that Mubarak undergo a DNA test, claiming that the ex-leader actually died in 2004 and had been replaced by an impostor."

Outside the courtroom, pro-Mubarak and anti-Mubarak protesters clashed, with riot police – likely the same who forced sit-in protesters out of Meydan Tahrir on Monday – surrounding the building. This and the events inside the court are being broadcast live on Egyptian State television, and the world is tuning in.

Mubarak and sons were flown in to a police academy in Cairo on a helicopter, and Mubarak was transported in an ambulance from there. Someone cracked on twitter: "After years of causing Cairo traffic jams because of his large motorcades, Mubarak finally uses a helicopter." Still, with over 20,000 documents relevant to the trial to go through this court case will jam up airtime, energy and courtrooms for a long time to come.

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this trial yet.

While many Egyptians are relieved, despite the long process ahead, that Mubarak and his sons may finally be punished for the dictatorship, the army's role in subverting the still-ongoing revolution must also be a focus. After all, it was only after the army's brutal expulsion of protesters in Meydan Tahrir on April 9 that the arrest of Mubarak and his family took place. In many ways, this trial is a showpiece. Another attempt by the military to distract Egyptians from their own despotism. While many are well aware of this, Mubarak facing trial and conviction for his crimes against the people is still very important. I doubt this trial will keep the military safe from further demonstrations and actions just as I doubt this trial will end well – whether Mubarak is convicted or not. This spectacle is disturbing to me, and I don't think imprisoning or executing the Mubarak family will mean justice is served. Aside from my own objections to the global prison-industrial complex, the anger of the Egyptian people will only be temporarily sated by those potential outcomes. We need something besides revenge to keep us going. We need real justice, meted out by a real government. We need an end to the military rule of Egypt. We need jobs with living wages, good strong public education, migrant poor workers to be able to live without fear of harassment and violence. And to accomplish this, we need to drag ourselves away from this ominous trial and focus on taking power back from Mubarak, the military and the oppression both institutionalized together.

Photo credit: AFP/Getty Images

August 3, Niger

Let's celebrate Niger's independence day with a recording of Omara "Bombino" Moctar, whose story of exile — and return — speaks to many youth in the country.

Along with Rap music:

that is sometimes danceable…

sometimes political…

and sometimes incorporates tradition.

Rap group Tchakey hops on the Night Nurse Riddim(!) to talk about freedom of expression.

Since independence, music from Niger's various ethnic groups that had traditionally been separate, such as the Hausa, Taureg, Berber, Fula, and Songhai started mixing with each other, and with Western sounds like Jazz, Blues, and Reggae giving Nigerien music a distinct feel, a place where North, East, and West Africa meet.

A live performance by Moussa Poussi where Mami Wata, the water goddess gets a roots reggae dedication:

This great Coupe Decale influenced Hausa song was shared not too long ago on Sahel Sounds:

Three of the countries top women singers get together for a song with a social awareness message.

Support from The Festival in the Desert, and both upcoming and established Western labels has benefited Nigerien artists such as Etran Finatawa who formed at the festival in 2004…

Happy Nigerien Independence Day!

Cape Doctor

Photo Credit: Doreen R