Group Exhibition
6 July - 9 November 2024

Exhibition Opening: Saturday 6 July 2024
Exhibition Closure: Saturday 9 November 2024 Share Facebook Twitter

WHATIFTHEWORLD is pleased to present Significant Other, a group exhibition featuring the works of local and international artists.

The term “significant other” has emerged as a pivotal, gender-neutral descriptor for an intimate partner, encapsulating the fluidity and diversity of modern relationships. In its ambiguity, “significant other” reflects the philosophical underpinnings of the distinguished Martinican philosopher Édouard Glissant and his concept known as the “right to opacity”, derived from his seminal work Poetics of Relation (1990).

The concept postulates that individuals and cultures possess an inherent complexity that must be acknowledged and preserved. This right to opacity advocates for the recognition of depth and mystery, standing as a counterpoint to reductive and essentialist portrayals of human identity and cultural expression.

The interplay of artists, diverse materials, and mediums unveils an entanglement of complexities, with the body as its focal point. Similar to land, the body is a politicised terrain, functioning as both a barometer for residual trauma and a reservoir of insight. Within this dynamic, each artist presents a unique engagement that unravels and reconstructs the body’s significance and place. Through gestures of reclamation and subversion, the works collectively affirm the body’s multiplicity, while challenging norms imposed by heteronormative essentialism. Viewers are thus invited to engage with the conceptual and corporeal fluidity of the body, extending one’s mind beyond one-track narratives.

Contemporary visual culture is prodded and probed by Pierre Fouché, whose romantic approach seamlessly blends historical iconographies with meticulous craftsmanship. Preconceived notions of order and stability are disrupted in the work of Brett Seiler, whose figurative paintings defiantly juxtapose flatness against depth. Such formal conventions are adapted and tested once again with Nigerian photographer Lakin Ogunbanwo, who masterfully draws attention to form and silhouette inspired by traditional African studio photography. In The (silent) History of Sodomy, Roelof van Wyk’s Die Kaapse Vlek/The Cape Stain (1652-1769) unearths hidden histories, tracing sodomy laws from 1532 to their repeal in 1997. Through poetic visuals, Van Wyk reimagines the role of digital imaging in revealing shifting identities and queer narratives shaped by past and present.

The poetics of being are further explored in the paintings of João Gabriel, Oliver Scarlin, Banele Khoza, and Michael Taylor, whose works traverse themes of desire, loss, vulnerability, personal memory, the sublime, and projections of intuition shaped by queer narratives and the homoerotic experience. Larry Stanton’s poignant portraits, created in Manhattan before his death from AIDS, recall a vanished era, a period that Stanton himself lost to the disease. Louis Fratino’s intimate paintings and drawings, rooted in personal memory, reveal the human body as a vessel of profound emotional expression. As such, the complexities of existence as a queer vessel are illuminated by the remnants of the people, loved ones, and memories evident in Significant Other.

The tension between intimacy and resistance is captured in the textured surfaces of Ben Orkin’s ceramic vessels, hinting at the erotic while bearing the imprint of the sculptor’s tactile sensibility. The rendering of the body as a coveted artefact is also explored in the work of Strauss Louw, whose photographs express the relationships between desire, one’s environment, and the gaze. Finally, Athi-Patra Ruga constructs a mythical universe, inviting self-reflection and critique of political, cultural, and social structures.

Each artist carves a unique path, collectively shaping a narrative that defies reductionism and embraces the vast complexity of existence and relationality. Their works stand as acts of resistance against simplistic categorisations, beckoning us to dwell within the diversity and ambiguity of the human experience, where the intimate and the political, the personal and the collective, continually intersect and transform.

Text by Nkhensani Mkhari