29 May , 2024
Public Art in Post-Apartheid Johannesburg
Johannesburg was the progeny of the nineteenth-century Industrial Revolution, no less than Manchester in the first quarter of the century or Chicago in the last. Financial Speculation, and gold bullion for the world market, were principal preconditions for Johannesburg’s existence.
– Clive Chipkin, Johannesburg Style.
Were it not for the discovery of gold in the late 1800’s, Johannesburg would likely not exist at all, but here we are now making sense of a mix of Dutch and British colonialism, the apartheid era coupled with the accomplishments and failings of political leadership since the birth of our democracy in 1994.
The negative impact of apartheid spatial planning on all aspects of social, economic and political life for black, coloured and Indian communities is immeasurable and particularly difficult to discern for a visitor without proper orientation to South Africa’s urban and rural areas.
Perhaps, the City of Johannesburg’s Heritage Department’s recent launch of their digital catalogue featuring 70 public artworks produced over the past two decades, can provide a lens for a rereading of Johannesburg in a post-apartheid context.
From early strategising on Johannesburg’s creative economy, inspired by Charles Landry, to participation in the development of the % for Public Art Policy in 2006, The Trinity Session has been actively involved in re-imagining Johannesburg’s public realm, through public art curation and implementation informed by city centred urban regeneration as well as place-making projects in Johannesburg’s surrounding neighbourhoods and townships.
Since 2017 there has been a shift in City thinking from short list and competition based commissioning of permanent works, to engaging the cultural specifics of the local, in turn deploying a more agile and adaptive approach to unearthing hidden, emerging, and established historical and, cultural reference points for new works of art integrated into new mixed use social clusters.
As we reflect on 30 years of democracy in South Africa, visiting the 70 works highlighted in the City’s new public art catalogue, will sadly bring first-time visitors into close contact with a city in a state of collapse.
From The Trinity Session’s perspective there are numerous entry points to appreciating and understanding the existence of these artworks; from policy leadership and precinct planning imperatives to re-imagining history and memory in a post-apartheid era, to creating an entirely new economy for the arts in Johannesburg, the levels of City investment have been substantial. Yet, public realm infrastructure in South Africa at large, is in deep crisis.
As an artist collective founded in 2001, The Trinity Session embarked on this practice, because the Johannesburg of the nineties perpetuated the frontier town behaviours of the mining town of the early 1900’s.
The cultural politics of post-‘94 Johannesburg were remarkable, the international artworld descended on the city during its two Biennials, artists of colour had access in new ways, and while the city had experienced significant white flight, new urban cultural practices were emerging.
For Trinity there was a rapidly changing city and evolving cultural landscape to engage with, beyond museum and gallery systems.
The public art practice to which we refer is multifold, from client board room strategy, to on-the- ground implementation, ‘community’ engagement, skills development and on-the-job training, translation of history and memory into new urban art objects, each often bespoke in concept and design translation and result, has been an important part of a practice concerned with an intimate understanding of the revisioning of Johannesburg after apartheid.
With the frontier town dynamics of nineties Johannesburg in mind, it is all the more fascinating, ironic, and timeous, that we at The Trinity Session find ourselves managing the implementation of Io Makandal’s commission for A Feral Commons at Victoria Yards, against a backdrop of political uncertainty and urban decay. That the artists installation does not prioritise human subjects is all the more cunning in relation to so many of the grand gestures the city is celebrating today. In the spirit of Jaime Lerner’s urban acupuncture Io Makandal’s ‘snake-bridge’ reminds us of interventionist practices foregrounding an intelligence of productive change making and heightened environmental awareness.
In closing, Tairone Bastien’s observations in his curators text, around adaptation and resilience usher in prescient ways of seeing our cities amidst so much collapse. In this sense Io Makandal’s work causes us to reflect and re-imagine our tendencies of dominance through permanence in favour of collaboration and alignment with ferality.
Stephen Hobbs is an artist and urbanist living and working in Johannesburg. In 2001 he cofounded The Trinity Session an artist collective, and consultancy based between Johannesburg and Vienna – specializing in public art installations, multi-media performances and placemaking through art.
Reference:
Clive M. Chipkin. Johannesburg Style: Architecture and Society 1880’s – 1960’s. p.5. David Phillip Publishers, Cape Town. 1993