Vakalisa Arts Associates, 1982–1992: Reflections

by Keith Adams

Download this essay as a PDF

South Africa has undergone many political, social and economic changes since the arrival of the colonists on its shores in the early 17th century. Both British and white Afrikaner minority rule effectively dispossessed the local black majority of land, resources, and basic human rights. The apartheid era precipitated different forms of resistance, and amongst the dissidents were artists, or cultural workers. Vakalisa Arts Associates, the well-known 1980s Cape Town group, exemplified the use of art as a tool of liberation.

Read More

“Ordinary People, Ordinary Issues, Ordinary Emotions”: Practising with Garth Erasmus and black consciousness

by Thulile Gamedze

“Although much still remains to be discovered, and still more to be developed, this Biko—who knew that we inhabit a ‘larger world than the sophisticated westerner’—still has a lot to say. This Biko belongs to a different order of time, heterogeneous and dense, where the dead still live with us, and past and present are reconfigured in the instantaneous time of the here and now.” [1]

Read More

Garth Erasmus: the knots of time and place

by Valeria Geselev

Download this text as a PDF

“I was Simply Never Part of The Dance. I Was a Wall Flower.”

I can’t recall the first time I met Garth Erasmus. It might have been in 2014 at one of his performances with As Is in Observatory, Cape Town. Or it could have been in 2015 at an exhibition opening or a workshop hosted by Greatmore in the neighbouring Woodstock. He was around being active, and I was around being curious. [1]

Read More