Theses and Dissertations (Visual Arts)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/2263/32444

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Care/full curating: mapping hybrid curatorial practices from social distancing to digital intimacy
Mahomed, Shenaz (University of Pretoria, 2025-10)
Curatorial practice coupled with the digital, applied through a care ethics framework, brings a new dimension to how we approach art exhibitions and our engagement with visual artists and audiences. This study engages with literature on care ethics in light of curatorial practice and its use of social media and digital platforms in South Africa. In this study, I argue that a hybrid strategy of curatorship unfolded due to the COVID-19 pandemic, orchestrated by care, and mediated via the digital. Due to the nature of the curatorial field – one of relation and connection between various systems, it would become the responsibility of a curator to deploy and practice meaningful modes of connection, dialogue and engagement. This study explores a primary case study of the Javett Art Centre at the University of Pretoria, and how their curatorial policies and practices, between the COVID-19 pandemic (2019 and 2022), reflected on “care” as an instrument in hybrid interdisciplinary curatorial practices. In doing so, this study seeks to establish the relevance of digital media in curatorial discourse, as the significance of care ethics in curatorial practices impacts the facilitation of exhibitions, physically and virtually. With communication at our fingertips and instant, the development of technologies and growing population (and therefore consumption) raise new and complex moral issues. This study suggests that a response to these new conditions can be addressed through a powerful approach to care strategies in curatorial practice. This study frames its argument around collaboration and more meaningful engagements with community and audience.
Is your refrigerator running? media ecology and fridge design from 1913 to 2023
Nel, Robin (University of Pretoria, 2025-12-14)
My dissertation investigates the domestic refrigerator through the lens of Marshall McLuhan’s media ecology, positioning the fridge not simply as a household appliance but as a medium that actively shapes patterns of behaviour, social organisation, and cultural meaning. By working with McLuhan’s tetrad (enhancement, obsolescence, retrieval, and reversal) the study examines how the refrigerator mediates domestic life, food practices, and even forms of identity from 1913 to 2023. This approach allows the fridge to be understood as a technological environment that conditions how people relate to time, space, memory, and one another. The dissertation is organised into five chapters. It opens with an introduction and literature review, followed by an outline of McLuhan’s media theory to establish the conceptual grounding. A historical timeline then traces the development, design changes, and cultural adoption of the fridge over the past century. The core of the study applies the tetradic analysis to reveal the fridge’s layered media effects, and the final chapter synthesises the findings while reflecting on limitations and opportunities for further research.
A postcolonial reading of selected afterimages of atrocities in Africa from 1994-2013
Kembo, Boitumelo Tapologo (University of Pretoria, 2025-03)
This research examined and critiqued selected afterimages of African atrocities, namely, apartheid (1948-1994), the Rwandan Genocide (1994) and the Democratic Republic of Congo Wars (1998-2003) through a Black gaze. The aforementioned atrocities are positioned as forms of cultural trauma that are historically catastrophic events emanating from colonial legacies that linger and shape the present. My investigation and analysis aimed to foreground and visually characterise the visual phenomenon that I describe as the spectacle of the black body in pain. This is a social phenomenon anchored in unethical visual practice by White or Western artists indulging in culturally insensitive conduct by exploiting and commodifying brutalised, mutilated, dead and decomposing black bodies as artworks positioned for aesthetic pleasure. This cultural insensitivity demonstrates a lack of respect for and/or understanding of local customs and cultural differences. The Black gaze is an oppositional gaze to the racist hegemonic white gaze that manifests concatenation of symbols and narratives that specify the spectacle of the body in pain. The concept of the Black gaze in this study is influenced by Postcolonial African Trauma theory, Africanfuturism, and Black Consciousness perspectives, both conceptually and philosophically. The Black gaze emanates from Blackness. To understand Blackness, one must embed it within the history of modernity, and the totality of its fragments of conquest and exploitation. The vantage point of continental African and African American history, Western humanism, racial slavery and racial capitalism are cauldrons in which the idea of Black difference is rooted. This includes the myriad of responses to its systems of oppression, forms of resistance and voicing. My specific focus is on the representational strategies and explicit violent visual regimes utilised to portray the trauma of postcolonial African atrocity on black bodies. I theorise that the black African body has endured constant violence and continues to be visually constructed as existing outside the realm of humanity, even in the postcolonial era. The eight artworks analysed in this study were produced from 1994 to 2013 by a diverse group of African, Diasporic and Western established artists, namely, Colin Richards (1996), Judith Mason (1998), Rafiki Ubaldo (1994), Richard Mosse (2011; 2012) and the international non-profit human rights organisation, WITNESS (2005). My critique focuses on the stereotypical, objectifying and sensationalist gaze applied in the depiction of traumatised black bodies using the persistent and presumptive notions that portray Africa as an exotic hinterland.
Visualising M’bona religious beliefs and practices : a visual cultural artistic co-production with the custodians of Khulubvi and Associated Rain Shrines in Nsanje, Malawi
Chikabadwa, Eva (University of Pretoria, 2025-06)
The study examines the role of the visual in research and documentation by analysing the power relations between the visual, oral, and written forms in the context of heritage preservation, drawing on theories of visual culture. The project aimed to visualise the M’bona beliefs and practices for the adornment of a future museum in a manner that strikes a balance among the three (visual, oral, and written) for heritage sustainability. The vision aligns with the concept of ‘decolonizing heritage for development,’ where development encompasses improvements in both material and non-material aspects, the ability to help others, and a change in individual and collective circumstances. Heritage, on the other hand, comprises skills, knowledge, and practices. In short, heritage development is a consequence of heritage and heritage making. The study organized the data using Ninian Smart’s seven dimensions of religion. It employed Clifford Geertz’s definition of religion, Talal Asad’s critique, the African Traditional Religions framework, and participants’ views to examine the M’bona culture as a religion. The Manganja M’bona advocates asserted that they do not consider the term ‘religion’ applicable in their culture. An experimental research approach, the ‘Meta Picture Data Collection Technique,’ which strikes a balance between textual, oral, and visual elements of heritage while prioritizing community involvement, was developed and used in the study. The technique aims to balance practice and theory in visual culture by emphasizing artmaking as a holistic approach, much like reading and writing texts for deeper studies.
Co-creating with materials : a practice-led approach to experimental printmaking
Le Roux, Caitlin (University of Pretoria, 2025-03)
This practice-led study investigates the relationship between the artist and material in the context of experimental printmaking as a relational approach, reimagining creative responsibility as a shared phenomenon among all agents involved in artistic practice. Grounded in posthumanist and new materialist theories, this study explores arguments of human-material relationships as relational and participatory. This study examines the entanglement of human and material agents within creative environments, challenging anthropocentric views of the processes, materials and tools involved in artistic practice. Responding to human-centric perspectives of agency, this study refers to Karen Barad’s agential realist ontology and Lambros Malafouris’ material engagement theories to reimagine agency as an emergent property of engagement rather than an attribute of the human subject. Furthermore, the idea of artworks as the manifestation of growing relationships between the artist and material in practice is theoretically considered through Donna Haraway’s notion of ‘becoming-with’. This study posits that creative agency extends beyond the human artist, acknowledging the active roles of materials and environments in the co-creation of artworks. This study employs an explorative experimental printmaking approach that emphasises tactile engagement and responsiveness to materials, allowing for a dynamic exploration of their inherent properties and behaviours through imprints and transfers. Informed by Bolt’s participatory methodology, I view the artist, materials, tools, and environment as co-responsible elements in the creative process. By relationally engaging with materials and tools that can be found and brought into both the domestic environment and printmaking studio, I seek to highlight these material participatory agents in the form of mark-making and surface impacts, thereby revealing their roles in the processes to the viewer. The creative process and outcomes were presented in an exhibition comprised of eight series of experimental prints, bringing attention to the creative agency of an artist-tools-materials-environment collective. Following a relational approach to creative research, I explore emerging tensions of knowledge generation through practice, reflecting on the processes and outcomes through documentary images and transcriptions. This study aims to broaden the understanding of shared creative agency in art practice, specifically in printmaking as an artistic process. Subsequently, this could lead to a more responsible approach to materials in creative practice and could decentralise the human artist by encouraging relational creative practices. This study critically evaluates the role of the material bodies in art practice as equally crucial to the role of the human artist.
Listening to the past : a subjective exploration of cultural continuity in Shona migration through sculptural works
Mapisire, Tatenda (University of Pretoria, 2025-03)
This study explores the intersections of cultural memory, migration, and identity through sculptural installations that merge personal narratives with historical Shona migratory experiences. Grounded in myth-making and oral histories, the research examines how contemporary art can serve as a vessel for ancestral knowledge, fostering dialogue between past and present migratory movements. Utilising natural materials such as clay, wood, stone, and found objects, the study reinterprets the materiality of Shona heritage while addressing the complexities of displacement, adaptation, and belonging. By engaging with archaeological traces from the Great Zimbabwe civilisation and Leopard Kopje migrations, the research situates contemporary migratory experiences within a broader historical continuum. Through a multidisciplinary approach that integrates art practice, historical analysis, and critical theory, this study demonstrates how sculpture and installation art can embody both personal and collective memories of migration. The research ultimately contributes to the discourse on cultural reinvention, offering a visual and sensory exploration of shifting identities in the context of urban transience and academic migration.
Queering final fantasy xiv online avatars on Instagram
Van Heerden, Carel Jacobus (University of Pretoria, 2024-11)
Gaymers are a group of players characterised by an adoption of a queer sensibility in their gaming habits. This study aims to understand the complex dynamics of online identity formation by examining how gaymers use virtual images of their avatars on social media platforms to construct identities collaboratively. The analysis focuses on the Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game Final Fantasy XIV Online and the social media platform Instagram as the site of research. This study employs a three-part research methodology. First, a comprehensive multidisciplinary literature review draws from gender studies, new media studies, visual culture, and virtual ethnography to establish a theoretical framework for analysing identified case studies taken from Instagram. Second, I compare interviews with gaymers and avatar portraits posted on Instagram to explore the themes identified in the literature review. Finally, a visual virtual ethnographic approach is adopted to conduct field research within the game world. The findings of this study validate the hypothesis that identity negotiation is an emergent process resulting from a combination of real-time social interaction within a role-play environment, asynchronous exploration of identity through textual and visual content generation on Instagram, and utilisation of in-game avatar design features for constructing and visually exploring identities through avatar customisation.
Rethinking iconicity : exploring the iconologies of apartheid-era documentary photography and South African networked social movements
Pather, Deneesher (University of Pretoria, 2024-06)
This thesis addresses the question of how political narratives are configured as aesthetic issues in selected images from apartheid, #AmINext and #FeesMustFall. The research questions are explored through iconological and hermeneutical interpretation. Sixty documents were collected for interpretation, thirty documentary photographs from the apartheid-era, fifteen images from #AmINext, and fifteen images from #FeesMustFall. The images were coded using the qualitative analysis software ATLAS.ti, and thematically curated using the online whiteboard platform Miro. Additional examples of what I refer to as “politically charged images” (PCI) were added to the Miro whiteboard to illustrate an aesthetics of politically charged imagery. The study addresses three main objectives. Firstly, through a Rancièrian theoretical framework, I explore how an anti-apartheid narrative is configured in apartheid-era documentary photographs, primarily through interpreting selected photographs by David Goldblatt and Ernest Cole. Second, I examine how political images can communicate similar political, social and cultural issues despite distances in time and space. Third, I interrogate the movement of past political images to online platforms and their interactions with more recent politically charged images on online platforms. I put forward the idea that politically charged imagery are constructing imagic conversations on shared social issues through time and space. I offer a renewed perspective on iconicity as a category for interpreting the political messages read in images. In my determination of the word, iconicity refers to the underlying qualities of images that inspires a sense of likeness, resonance, recognition and memory-recall. Whereas previous uses of iconicity have focussed on the word as a category to interrogate the material basis of icons as culturally impactive, my determination of the word stresses the immaterial aspects of image communication. Using Jacques Rancière’s concept of the aesthetic image, I position the selected apartheid-era photographs as constructing the politics of apartheid. The affective images of apartheid-era documentary photography contribute to an archive of virtual imagery that speak both to the local issue of apartheid and related universal issues connected to racial injustice, police brutality, and social inequalities. The images of #AmINext and #FeesMustFall are also argued to be affective images that have the potential to speak to other related social movements. In both networked social movements, the activists engage in body politics that make otherwise hidden violences visible. Lastly, I argue that the iconologies of #AmINext and #FeesMustFall consist of several perspectives of the movement formed through machinic interventions, images from the past and images that point to an empowered future for the activists.
Digital re-mediation in contemporary sculpture praxis : human-technology co-creation
Kuhn, Carol (University of Pretoria, 2025-07)
Digital Re-Mediation in Contemporary Sculpture Praxis: Human-Technology Co-Creation," presents a hermeneutic interpretation of the praxes of traditionally trained sculptors now working in a postdigital (analogue-digital) reality. It examines digital technology’s mediating role to show how the infolding of digitised bodies and embodied technologies form a co-creating nonlinear affective intra-action between the sculptor, digital device, and material. In this re-mediated hybrid reality, sculptor-digital technology relations respectively characterise a postdigital reassemblage defined by the notion of agentic matter constituting a performative sense of becoming-with the digital. Postphenomenology and New Materialism are used to theorise digital fabrication technology’s multistable conditions of use and interpret sculptors’ intentions and materially situated relationality with the device. The study shows sculptors’ embodied interactions occur through, with, alongside, and towards digital technologies, and the neomaterial aesthetic arising from this agentic entangled system of physical and non-tangible matter reterritorialises contemporary sculpture within the digital paradigm.
Representing the unknown : a comparative study of Chesley Bonestell and David Kipping's representations of outer space
Willemse, Carel Pieter (University of Pretoria, 2025-03)
The representation of space has long captivated the public, artists, and scientists alike, inspiring them to envision the uncharted expanses beyond our planet and make representations of the cosmic unknown. Chesley Bonestell, a pioneer of space art, enthralled audiences with his vivid paintings of distant worlds, while David Kipping, a contemporary astronomer, harnesses YouTube to transport viewers into speculative realms. Despite their differing mediums, both Bonestell and Kipping expand our understanding of outer space through cosmological representations that bridge the gap between naked-eye observation and advanced technological mediation. By examining how scientific inquiry and artistic creativity intersect, this study compares their works, explores their creations aligned with advancements in observational technology – particularly through the lens of Immanuel Kant and Edmund Burke’s sublime – in the broader context of astronomy and cosmology.
What is a human? the ontology of personhood and human-centred design
Kirstein, Marno Johan (University of Pretoria, 2024-02)
For the last few decades, human-centred design has increasingly been a dominant paradigm in communication design. The Human-centred Design Movement (HCDM) is broadly motivated by three core ethical concerns: (1) environmental sustainability, (2) sustainable social development, and (3) designs that improve human lives by one metric or another. Despite these lofty concerns, the field continues to be beleaguered by unethical practices—even in the sub-disciplines that developed within HCDM. I argue that HCDM has faltered in its aims because it is based on human centred design principles (HcD) that fail to grapple with its primary subject: namely, to understand what a human being is, at an ontological level. Its current approach is to describe humanness in terms of design epistemology, but this demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of ethics, which is necessarily personalist. In this study I form a multi-disciplinary hermeneutic drawing on Schelerian phenomenology, Ricoeurian hermeneutics and Franklian existenzanalyse to form a more robust and coherent picture of the ontology of personhood. I critically examine the claims and commitments of HCDM through these disciplinary lenses to identify the gaps, false dichotomies and false equivocations that have hamstrung its attempts to improve disciplinary ethics in communication design. By the end of the study, I make recommendations for the way ahead, suggesting falsehoods that HCDM scholars need to stop perpetuating, truths they need to tell, and questions they need to answer.
An exploration of otherworldliness and death in avant-garde Japanese poster design
Botes, Lindie (University of Pretoria, 2025-02-18)
This study examines the multi-faceted visual and metaphoric representations of otherworldliness and death in avant-garde Japanese posters from the post-World War II era. Following Japan’s surrender in World War II, the country experienced significant socio-political turmoil and transformation. It is in this context that the subversive Japanese avant-garde ethos was born. Focusing primarily on posters designed for angura (underground) theatre and film productions, this study analyses the socio-political, ideological, historical, religious and cultural reasons for the prevalence of otherworldliness and death as themes in the posters (from 1953 to 1989). To this end, a literature review presents Japanese perspectives on death, aesthetics, beauty, suicide and religion, which are intrinsically linked to the central themes of this study. Several definitions of otherworldliness are provided to facilitate a deeper understanding of the term. Philosophical and thanatological theories inform the theoretical framework, which is situated at the intersection of otherworldliness and death. The framework is subsequently applied for purposes of a comprehensive case study analysis of selected avant-garde posters. The significance of this study lies in its in-depth exploration of the underlying causes and visual expressions of the prevalent themes of death and otherworldliness in avant-garde posters, which, at the same time, reflect the socio-political and cultural milieu of post-war Japan.
A hermeneutic analysis of the representation of masculinities in Tsotsi (Hood 2005) and Inxeba (Trengrove 2017)
Pityana, Nomathamsanqa Freya Jewkes (University of Pretoria, 2024-08)
A hermeneutic analysis of the South African films Tsotsi (Hood 2005) and Inxeba (Trengrove 2017) on the representation of masculinities. Gender and gender performance is explored as well as how types of masculinities are portrayed and the effect(s) they have (if any) on the story. Additionally, how the directors being white, yet telling black stories, affects the storyline as well as the reception received by each film based on this factor.
Examining agency in self-portraits by selected black female artists
Yanta, Nandipha Nthabiseng Liziwe (University of Pretoria, 2024-10)
Global feminism and global black feminism are central to this study as I investigate the agency of (black) women in the Western art canon because it shows how women's empowerment has developed over time. Feminist art is a crucial part of this study because it shows that female artists have navigated and challenged a traditionally patriarchal industry. This is explored through artists like Judy Chicago from the United States of America (USA) as well as Penny Siopis and Sue Williamson from South Africa, alongside critical perspectives of theorists like Marion Arnold (1996), Brenda Schmahmann (2015), and Karen von Veh (2006; 2019). In recent decades, there has been an apparent shift in the representation of black women in visual culture with global artists like Mickalene Thomas, Amy Sherald, and Wangechi Mutu expressing themes of assertiveness, confidence, and beauty in their art. By examining the works of artists like Jean-Marc Nattier and Edouard Manet, I also trace the evolution of black women’s representation in the Western art canon. I examine self-portraiture as a feminist strategy, analysing the works of famous self-portraitists like Amrita Sher-Gil, Frida Kahlo and Cindy Sherman who have challenged gender stereotypes along with Carrie Mae Weems and Renee Cox who convey black female subjectivity in their artwork. My primary objective for this study is to show how selected prolific black female artists, namely Mary Sibande, Zanele Muholi, Billie Zangewa, and Zandile Tshabalala assert agency in their self-portraits through different (black) feminist strategies such as the oppositional gaze, self-definition, and self-love.
That’s our code : a feminine artistic encoding of memories of the South African Defence Force between 1977 and 1989 and hegemonic masculinity in white South African men
Glass, Georgina Alice (University of Pretoria, 2023-09-26)
This study explores memory and narrative surrounding experiences of conscription into the South African Defence Force (SADF) during the 1970s and 80s. This decade experienced the climax and end of several conflicts grouped under the collectively remembered ‘Border War’. The conscription of white South African men into the military is understood by many veterans as a coming-of-age ritual and an induction into manhood. When the National Party conceded in 1994, many soldiers felt betrayed by the government they risked their lives to protect. Many of these soldiers are silent about their experiences and this study provided an opportunity for participating veterans to recount experiences of the former South African Defence Force (SADF), specifically surrounding the creation of masculinity and the sharing of pain and trauma. I have combined two binary and gendered codes, Morse code and knitting, to encode narratives shared with me by participating veterans, thereby capturing memories from a group who feel they are forgotten. In addition, I use stitching to investigate my relationship to the SADF and trauma, using a spiral motif to explore the cathartic release of sharing stories and the great difficulty in sharing vulnerability and pain.
An autoethnographic exploration of virtual worship : exploring religious experience in cyberspace
Chizhande, Kudakwashe (University of Pretoria, 2024-02)
Technology has revolutionised the traditional concept of worship and impacted the understanding of spirituality. The rise of the internet and digital technologies has revolutionised how individuals interact with each other and their surroundings, including religious spaces. This autoethnographic exploration delves into the experience of virtual worship and how the digital revolution is transforming spiritual experiences. Based on my personal experiences and observations, I have investigated the world of virtual worship and discovered the unique religious experiences it offers in cyberspace. It also reveals the potential for technology to facilitate religious experiences through virtual sacred spaces and discusses the possibility of these online experiences replacing worship in physical reality. I have discovered that virtual worship provides advantages such as connecting with a global community of believers and the convenience of participating in religious activities from the comfort of their own homes. However, there are also possible drawbacks, including a lack of intimacy and connection with the physical world. This exploration highlights the intricate and evolving relationship between technology and spirituality and how virtual worship shapes our religious experiences. The study contends that virtual worship cannot substitute offline gatherings, but that online and offline spiritual practices can be used since they are vital in their different capacities. Furthermore, the study emphasises that while virtual worship experiences hold immense value as they allow flexibility and accessibility, they may lack some embodied aspects of worship, such as physical presence and shared space. Overall, this autoethnographic exploration provides valuable insights into how virtual worship experiences impact religious practice and suggests that digital technologies could complement physical worship spaces rather than replace them entirely. Thus, the study expands on the scholarship of digital culture and virtual worship by considering an autoethnographic experience of the phenomenon.
The dancing body as living archive : preserving the Cecchetti method
Annandale, Celeste Margaret (University of Pretoria, 2024-03)
Dance is largely an intangible form of art and knowledge. The fleeting nature of its performance makes the circulation and archiving of this type of knowledge quite challenging. It is difficult to capture its essence in a mere text or photograph. The body, in this sense, might present itself as a fundamental form of dance knowledge preservation as it is able to embody knowledge in a way that material artefacts cannot. Despite many and continual changes that occur in the arts, the technique and traditions of classical ballet have therefore remained as dancers and teachers transfer this knowledge, through their bodies, from one generation to the next. The bodies of dancers and teachers, in this sense, become a dynamic archive of embodied knowledge. This involvement of the body in processes of knowledge acquisition, retention and transference manifests the agency of these bodies as they function both as object and subject, as instrument and agent, transgressing the boundaries between the material and immaterial worlds, the visible and invisible spaces of existence and experience, as well as the past and the present. This is the notion of the body which I use in my study; a dynamic entity, with boundary-crossing abilities, which holds great significance in knowledge transfer and preservation, hegemonic resistance, artistic expression, memory, transformation and evolution. The Cecchetti Method of classical ballet training and the Cecchetti Society, with its teachers and dancers actively participating in the learning, teaching and therefore preservation of the Method, epitomises how bodies become an archive. My study is more broadly involved in the larger academic enterprise that revisits and revises the institutional archive and questions our dependence on documentary and mnemonic practices.
We’re digging the future: Afro-future mining in Africa
Kgongoane, Obakeng Omolemo (University of Pretoria, 2024-04-19)
Mining in Africa continues to be a relevant and important endeavour in building up the African economy, however, it is also a site that encapsulates the history, (re-)organisation, and on-going consequences of colonialism, imperialism, capitalism and heteropatriarchy – a few of the key issues that continue to permeate Africa’s socio-political and economic struggles. While Afrofuturism provides pathways towards future-orientated, often technological, solutions for present-day concerns, little attention is given to the ways that Afrofuturistic representations can act as critical, cultural, and political frameworks, as well as aesthetic counterpoints, to Euro-dominated conceptions of mining within African contexts. This study, therefore, engages with literature on Afrofuturism in light of Afrofuturistic visual texts such the films Black Panther (Coogler 2018) and Neptune Frost (Uzeyman & Williams 2022), as well as the artwork of African contemporary artist, Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga, such texts are used to explore Afrofuturistic representations of mining and the miner – past, present, and future, in Africa. In doing so, the study hopes to demonstrate the relevance and power of Afrofuturism in working through and beyond issues of the black miner’s exploitation, subjugation, and continued marginalisation; a positioning of the miner that aids and abets black living as an impossibility. Additionally, this study seeks to establish that within African contexts that are increasingly technologised, there exists new ways to narrate the lives and identification of the black miner, new ways that are often free to emerge in Afrofuturistic representations. In critically analysing Afrofuturistic visual representations related to mining in Africa, this study further uncovers how Afrofuturism utilises the power of narrative through a strategic relation of images, that although contextualised in the future, are in constant dialogue with the past. Afrofuturism’s deliberate oscillation between the past and future in the images of African mining under analysis, make the past alive to the present contexts of the living. Consequently, this re-awakening of the past for the presently living allows for a more urgent and critical re-assessment, re-investigation, and a re-imagination of new and liberating possibilities for the future that actively centre, and therefore value, the marginalised voices of the black oppressed – the black miner.
Traces of interaction : a practice-led exploration of ‘makerspaces’ in South African art
du Toit, Marika (University of Pretoria, 2024-04)
Recent formulations of the artist-artwork-audience relationship have considered artists as context providers, artistic objects as repositories for ideas and a means to preserve tacit knowledge. Further, audiences have been reconsidered as creating meaning situationally within exhibition spaces. Although, artists are often inclined to present an artist statement, which can be perceived as a singular and ‘correct’ way to interpret art exhibitions, and which may prohibit viewers from trusting their own sense-making capabilities and interpretative skills. An overreliance on exhibition texts could discourage the formation of alternative forms of knowledge through embodied interactions with the work. This practice-led study explores these considerations of an entangled artist-artwork-audience relationship through a participatory approach. The artworks were created with public engagement in mind, and an emphasis placed on inviting physical interventions within the exhibition space. These works were exhibited as invitations for public participation in a series of two exhibitions. Installations of this nature aim to create a space for making, collaboration and creative expression, referred to in this practice-led study as “makerspaces”. After each installation, the artist reflected on and responded to the participants’ interventions as their actions left material residues of embodied participation. The role of the artist within this entangled artist-artwork-audience relationship can accordingly raise questions regarding artistic authority, meaning-making and knowledge production. Processes of creation, destruction, assimilation and erasure were documented and reflected on, following a practice-led methodology. By encouraging the audience to investigate the materials, the traces of others and their actions this creative research aims to provoke critical insights into embodied, material engagement in exhibitions that invite audience interaction without prescriptive instruction.
Muffled violations: a practice-based exploration of artworks embedded with the traumatic memory of acquaintance rape
Peffer, Cazlynne (University of Pretoria, 2024-06-14)
Muffled violations is an artistic exploration of the trauma endured by a victim of acquaintance rape. Through qualitative and practice-based approaches, this study argues that viewers may encounter affects of sexual violation and respond empathetically with the artist-researcher through an assemblage of found objects and video works in an exhibition. The artworks offer an account of rape more attuned to the psychological impact experienced by victims, rather than that of reports on sexual brutality found in journalistic media. This study also reviews a selection of contemporary works made by female artists, to investigate how art implicitly, through its particular communicative strengths can be regarded as an affective means through which representations and perceptions of sexual violence can be reconfigured. Through the making of art, this study aims to bring attention to alternative narratives of rape that often go undocumented and to position these voices within a South African context of pervasive sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV).

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