Arts pioneers aim to outpace the barbarism

Geoff Sifrin

Taking Issue

In contrast to this cultural barbarism, South Africa is fortunate to also have visionaries who are cultivating South African art, such as entrepreneur Benji Liebmann, who has established a huge, lush sculpture garden in the Cradle of Humankind, called Nirox.

It is open to the public for a few months each year, featuring works by celebrated sculptors such as Angus Taylor, Willem Boshoff and others, and offers residencies for selected artists to live there to produce works. Two weeks from now, the festive opening for 2016 takes place. Equally bold, Liebmann’s son Jonathan is the developer of Maboneng arts precinct in Johannesburg’s CBD, where well-known and rising artists have studios.

Jews should be especially sensitive to artworks’ desecration, given Jewish history and their long-time involvement in the arts. As German-Jewish poet Heinrich Heine wrote prophetically in 1821: “Where they burn books, they will also ultimately burn people.” The burning of artworks is ominous.

UCT Vice-Chancellor Max Price faces an unenviable task, trying to hold the fort against destructive rampages born out of the Rhodes Must Fall movement. The university has now reacted by taking down or covering dozens of its artworks that might be considered “offensive”.

Its large collection includes 1 100 pieces displayed in 50 buildings on five campuses by 520 South African artists. The important Porer collection includes works by celebrated artists such as Steven Cohen, William Kentridge, Cecil Skotnes, Pippa Skotnes, Zwelethu Mhethwa, Stanley Pinker, Marion Arnold, Guy Tillim, Malcolm Payne, Mark Hipper and Paul Stopforth. Other artists include Diane Victor and anti apartheid playwright Breyten Breytenbach, who have expressed dismay at the removal or covering of their works.

A UCT task team is assessing the collection through the prism of transformation and inclusivity, particularly pieces which might offend for how they depict black people, and looking – according to its brief – for artworks that “may be seen to recognise or celebrate colonial oppressors”.

With South Africa’s history of white domination and contempt for black people, one can understand black students’ ire at pieces they find offensive. Some of UCT’s halls are adorned with portraits of dead white men in colonial mode, evoking discomfort. To add to this is the dominant colonial-era architecture, influencing the students’ experience of it.

However, great art can come from anywhere, notwithstanding the artist’s politics. JH Pierneef’s landscape paintings, for example, are exceptional despite his racism and role in the Broederbond. Johannesburg’s Standard Bank Gallery recently hosted a major exhibition of his works.

For Jews, Wagner’s music has long been beyond the pale because of his anti-Semitism and status as Hitler’s favourite composer. For years, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra did not play Wagner. Yet classical music without Wagner would be infinitely poorer.

Some of the world’s greatest, provocative artists have been Jews, such as the Abstract Expressionists in New York in the 1940s, riddled with Jewish names – Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler, Barnett Newman and others.

South Africa’s cultural battle, like the political one, will be fought for many years to come. Its post-apartheid identity, politically and culturally, is in flux. The best art provokes questioning. If we only allow sanitised, politically correct works which toe the “party line”, society will be the worse for it.

Wily politicians are adept at pursuing agendas through narrow racial prisms. This is as dangerous in politics as it is in the arts.

Read Geoff Sifrin’s regular columns on his blog sifrintakingissue.wordpress.com