Manifest through staged photography, performance, installation, video and sculpture – Ferreira’s debut solo exhibition, The Status of Greatness, is principally concerned with unpacking and actively coercing the mechanics of political and cultural celebrity through the mimicry of historical precedent, fictional narratives and iconic, theatrical persona unique to numerous African states post-independence.
For its final show of 2008, Whatiftheworld / Gallery will present a major group exhibition entitled Big Wednesday, the first in a series of annual summer group shows. This year’s exhibition is co-curated by Julia Rosa Clark and Daniel Levi, and features a collection of new works by both resident and associated artists from Whatiftheworld. Paricipating artists include: AVANT CAR GUARD, Andrzej Nowicki, Matthew Hindley, Athi-Patra Ruga, James Webb, Zander Blom, Rowan Smith, Dan Halter, among others.
The exhibition How the troubles started shows the work of Wilhelm Saayman and Lizza Littlewort, two artists whose renown in the contemporary art scene is based in dark humourous commentary conveyed through annotated drawings which stretch and wrench graphic language.
Jan-Henri Booyens’ debut solo exhibition, The Matt Sparkle, comes to Whatiftheworld/Gallery in Cape Town this October, after showing at The Premises Gallery in Johannesburg. The exhibition works are focused primarily on the study of non-objective idiosyncratic landscapes and are distinctly rendered on medium and large scale canvases.
Georgina Gratrix presents her first solo offering, ‘Master Copy’ at Whatiftheworld / Gallery. Exploring the traditions, techniques and histories of painting, Gratrix flattens ‘Old Masters’, remixes classics and samples Modernisms in this bold exhibition that explores just what painting means within contemporary popular culture.
The much anticipated debut solo exhibition by recent Michaelis Prize winner Rowan Smith. Using the language of outdated retro-cool technology and handcrafted sculptures, Smith presents a series of works that subtly, sadly investigate a nostalgia for the future and an insatiable and unanswerable lust for something outside of our everyday experience.
FERREIRA PROJECTS in association with WHATIFTHEWORLD / GALLERY are proud to present Hypocrite’s Lament & The Drain Of Progress, an exhibition by highly acclaimed emerging South African Artists, Zander Blom and Julia Rosa Clark.
Featuring a selection of works that are contextualized through the medium of prints. Participating artists are encouraged to explore the idea of editions and multiples in new ways. Selected artists include: Avant Car Guard, Julia Rosa Clark, Daniel Halter, Cameron Platter, Doing it for Daddy, Peter Eastman, Rowan Smith, The President, Stuart Bird, Lizza Littlewort, Georgina Gratrix, and others.
Recently recognized by _Frieze_ Magazine as one of the most internationally significant solo exhibitions of 2007. The Drain of Progress comprises a set of one-off photographs, drawings, paintings and prints and includes the Cape Town launch of Zander’s first book, The Drain of Progress - A Catalogue Raisonné that provides a unique view of a stage set upon which Blom’s ongoing modernist experiment occurs.
For her début solo exhibition, Jacqui Stecher has composed a series of paintings that evoke themes of otherworldliness, watching and being watched, the charge of interior spaces, and the interaction of power and vulnerability. The works carry a subtle intensity in that their images are at once familiar and unfamiliar. Originally sourced from found images, these paintings of children’s heads against stark colour fields are ghostly presences, characters from Stecher’’s imagination that also seem quite eerily appropriate in ours.
Whatiftheworld / Gallery has been selected as one of 20 galleries from around Africa to exhibit at the inaugural Joburg Art Fair from the 13th to the 16th of March 2008. On sale will be the largest collection of African and South African contemporary art the world has ever seen - 5000 square metres of the Sandton Convention Centre have been booked for the event. Artlogic, the producers of the event, has invited galleries from three continents that focus on African contemporary art to participate in the first Joburg Art Fair.
A solo exhibition by emerging artist Jeanne Hoffman centered around drawing. The drawings in this exhibition move between layers of intuition, thought and language, and alternate between the double horizon of absence/presence, speaking/silence and space/place. These themes draw together the artist’s conception that drawing is above all an approach: a way of thinking.
‘Fresh Meat’ is a show of new painting, by a group of painters who have come together to strengthen the presence and position of their shared attitude. Painting tends to be hemmed in and misunderstood both by a conservative mainstream and by other artists who see themselves as conceptual. This group of painters is well acquainted with contemporary theory and philosophy of art, but is taking it into a new debate which aims, as Francis Bacon put it, to “deepen the game”. Exhibition curated by Robert Sloon (Artheat), with a limited edition catalogue available for purchase.
The first solo exhibition by artist Francois Van Reenen at Whatiftheworld / Gallery, feautring a selction of new sculptures, prints, paintings, and animation. A pioneer of Flash animation filmmaking in the 90’s and an accomplished sculptor, van Reenen extract’s sentimentality and nostalgia from his 50’s based toy and comic collection, transferring dilemmas of taste and emotion onto his prints and sculptures. The artist’s rye sense of humour and self conscious ironical take on the world combined with autobiographical references form the basis of his conceptual and aesthetic approach.
Whatiftheworld / Project Room presents an installation and wall painting by Cape Town based artist Ashleigh Mclean. Inspired by the graphics, slogans and sound of the cities transport routes the installation aspires to blind itself with this street specific glamour. Remixing Top taxi tracks and vernacular forms the booty bass audio component of the installation and is a collaborative effort with Cape Town artist Marco Filby.
Avant Car Guard are Zander Blom, Jan-Henri Booyens and Michael MacGarry - a three member visual art collective from Johannesburg. They have exhibited at a national and international level over the past 18 months, and have recently published a book on their production entitled Volume 1. Their approach to art production, the art world and their own collective role as a singular artist is characterized by a strong sense of humour and punk sensibility. Their approach focuses on conceptual art manifested through photography and performance.
The first solo exhibition by celebrated artist Peter Eastman at Whatiftheworld / Gallery. Eastman works from his studio in downtown Cape Town and is best known for his emphasis on surface textures using high-gloss, reflective enamel paint. “The result is invariably a slick and seamless reflection of Eastman’s aesthetic, concerned with the surface or skin of things as a force that simultaneously repels and invites penetration.” His work is included in numerous collections including the Hollard Collection, and he was selected as a finalist for both the Sasol New Signatures (2005) as well as the ABSA Atelier (2003).
Whatiftheworld / presents Number Two - the second in a series of projects and events for emerging designers, opening on Friday, 05 October, 2007 at 208 Albert Rd. Woodstock, Cape Town. Featuring a fashion show of emerging designers curated by avant-garde knitwear designer Richard de Jager (Pwhoa), as well as exhibitions of products and furniture by emerging industrial designers selected by the Whatiftheworld / Design Studio.
The second solo exhibition by up-and-coming young artist and illustrator Michael Taylor. Titled Nocturnes, Michael Taylor draws on his continuing theme of ‘nonsense’ to create small-scale paintings telling nocturnal stories. Not following a specific storyline, the pictures individually elucidate a happening around the hours of either twilight, midnight or dawn.
The launch exhibition at the Whatiftheworld / Project Room feautures new work by Johannesburg based visual art collective Avant Car Guard titled Naked frontier ambition vibes. Avant Car Guard recently had an extended exhibition at The Pure Project in New York City and published a book on their production entitled Volume 1.
Born in Kielce in Poland, before moving to South Africa, Andrzej Nowicki makes paintings and drawings that create parallel universes where people and objects multiply and metamorphose into ever more strange visions.
An exhibition of specially commisioned posters by thirty of the most talented designers and illustrators practicing today. Organised by Grafik magazine, in association with Letraset. A limited edition A5 postcard cataloge designed by Value and Service is available for purchase. Recently shown at Colette in Paris, Felt-Tip comes to Whatiftheworld for the opening exhibition of our new gallery space.
An exhibition by rising young documentary photographer Damien Schumann of portraits of people and families affected by the disease. This body of work has been exhibited as part of the 37th annual World TB and Lung Health Conference in Paris, France in November 2006 (sponsored by the Desmond Tutu TB Centre), as well as for World Aids Day in Amsterdam, Holland in December 2006, and at the Dutch Parliament for World TB Day in March 2007 (sponsored by KNCV TB Fund).
Following her much talked about and acclaimed graduate show at The Michaelis School of Fine Art, Ali Aschman will be having her debut solo exhibition at Whatiftheworld, centering aroung the theme of sleep; creating scenes somewhere between dreams and nightmares.
An exhibition by Johannesburg based artist Zander Blom. The Drain of Progress constitutes an installation of drawings and prints, and marks the launch of the sound album Empty Vessels. The album features audio compositions which follow the visual development of the drawings and prints towards a perverse and ironic embrace of Modernist abstraction.