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ART AND LIBERATION

Art and liberation

Compiled by Manelisi Manellie

The words ‘liberation’ and ‘freedom’ are often justifiably used in various settings concerning South Africa. ‘The liberation struggle’, ‘The struggle for freedom, ‘Freedom Day’ are all expressions common in the vocabulary of South African culture. According to the Oxford Dictionary, liberation is defined as “the action or an act of liberating someone or something or of setting someone free from bondage or oppression” or as “the condition of being liberated”. Similarly the definition of freedom is described as “personal liberty”, “the power of self-determination attributed to the will”. Freedom and liberation is an art form practiced on a daily basis by people all over the world regardless of circumstance. It is for this reason that the will to advance the level of awareness of local South African art is an act worth exploring, along with the power and manner in which art stimulates, the history of South African art and the relevant artwork made by artists in the current post-modern era. 

Access and availability of local South African art is seemingly met with many obstructions responsible for the lack of its prominence in most societies. Based on pure observation, these reasons include (amongst others) the prioritisation of international artists who are positioned at the centre of modern culture, classism in the art world which leads to minimal networking opportunities and community art organisations struggling to obtain funding. Arguably these circumstances are also grounds for the lack of art being freely accessible in South Africa. The side-effects suffered due to a lack of liberation or freedom may be recognised as being detrimental to human psychological health. In a publication which covers psychology, The Brain and The Mind Volume 2, Indian-American Neuroscientist, Vilayanur Ramachandran states that “studies of brain activity in people while they are looking at paintings provide evidence that each of those techniques can lead to nerve-cell activity associated with our perception of attractiveness or beauty. These studies also show that visual areas of the brain are more stimulated when looking at more appealing visual art”. 

The extent of art’s significance in modern culture goes as far as it being typically recognised for its aesthetic, sedentary role that it plays in popular culture. Additionally culture and arts is largely underestimated due to a flawed impression that art bears minimal commercial value or any value at all. Under most circumstances art is immobile and is thus misjudged for its ability to significantly mobilise society when viewing it from a socio-political perspective, however this is not how it all started. According to Bushmen Rock Art, a book written by Gavin Anderson in 1990, “the oldest art dates to +/-27 000 years ago. Research in the Drakensberg and Eastern Cape dates some of the San art to +/-6 000 years ago”. This book also mentions that historic ethnographies from the south western Cape detailed how at “certain occasions” Khoi-Khoi females would enter a cave for a period of time where they would paint their faces with circles and stripes. Anderson substantiated this through the evaluation of the finger dots, finger meats and handprints that subsist on many painted sites in the Western and Eastern Cape, where most of the handprint sizes fell within the range of females. Anderson states that many San women at the time married into Khoi-Khoi society resulting in the tradition of San painting being brought to pastoralists. 

(Tapestry of Positivities by Xolile Mtakatya, The Cape Gallery)

Fast-forward to modern times where the existence of artwork produced by artists such as Xolile Mtakatya, who before working as an artist was an active member of the Cape Youth Congress. When Mtakatya was detained for his political activism in 1986, he stated that while he was imprisoned he began scratching and drawing on the grey walls of the prison cell to relieve his frustration. After taking drawing lessons at the Community Arts Project in Woodstock, he took a course in media and had proceeded to study visual arts which ultimately led to a Diploma in Fine Arts in 1993 from The Foundation School of Art. This former student of Gugulethu High School has been involved in various community building projects and workshops involving arts and media (The Cape Gallery). His standout pieces include Tapestries of Positivities, a likely depiction of a powerfully personal moment captured through an illustration of abundant colour and an unrepentant South African delivery. Untitled and The Flight II, are stark, textured, multi-layered black and white presentations that are anecdotal and abstract, attesting to the minimal restrictions in the depths of Xolile Mtakatya’s creative expression.

The values of society in recent times unnaturally restricts engagement with skills, objects or environments that stimulate human beings or develops personhood. The restrictions on the access to local art is an issue that is called to be undertaken by society especially in a country that prides itself for its wealth of diverse cultures. The onus seems to be on each individual in society to conjure up a level of self-determination that may encourage a will that sees to the continued existence of art, particularly local art that transcends time and space. All in all the power of these works of imagination is realised in the experience of Xolile Mtakatya who faced the antithesis of liberation and freedom during his imprisonment for fighting for what he believed in and his eventual progression to being a extraordinarily seasoned and talented artist.

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