Published August 04, 2022
On 9 August, entrance to Javett-UP will be accessible in celebration of National Woman’s Day. We look forward to welcoming you to a walkabout with members of the Yakhal’Inkomo curatorial team, Phumzile Nombuso Twala, supported by Sipho Mdanda.
We hope that you will join us - Click here to RSVP
On the 27th of August, Javett-UP’s Curatorial Director, Gabi Ngcobo, and some exhibiting artists will host a curatorial dialogue about SCENORAMA. This recently launched experimental curatorial platform activates the gallery space as a living and changing space, with works growing and spilling out into the outside areas of the Javett-UP.
On this day, the Javett-UP will be serving Magna Carta Wines. In the words of Christian Eedes of Wine Mag, natural wine “at its simplest, is the dictum of nothing added, nothing taken away.” This dedication to innovation, care and preservation of natural techniques makes Magna Carta the perfect partner to join us for our first SCENORAMA curatorial dialogue.
The month of August is dedicated to honouring South African women by celebrating the brevity and resolve that compelled some 20 000 women from all parts of the country to peacefully march to the union buildings in Pretoria on the 9th of August, 1956. These women demanded an end to the oppression of black women and, by extension, all forms of oppression legislated by the apartheid government against the freedom of black people. Women's activism has historically been a solid, often unrecognised structure of South Africa’s liberation.
The Yakhal’Inkomo exhibition is based on a collection assembled and named after the artist, curator and cultural worker activist Bongi Dhlomo. The collection features work by significant black women artists, such as Mmakgabo Helen Sebidi, the late Bonnie Ntshalintshali, the Mapula Embroidery Collective, Jane Makhubele and Noria Mabasa. The exhibition and the few women featured in the collection also serve as a time marker that allows us to understand that black women have been among the most deprived of all freedoms, including the freedom to think and create in the artistic field. Through our multi-disciplinary programmes at Javett-UP, we recognise that this balance is shifting and that young black women and gender-neutral people are taking centre stage and making significant work that can speak to all humanity. We believe this is the route towards destroying all systems of oppression. We honour all women and gender-neutral individuals for continuing to hold half the sky.
SCENORAMA, the curatorial project launched at the Javett-UP in May 2022, speaks to these freedoms from a global pan-African perspective. It helps us position our questions towards endless streams of possible answers.