Headlines in the news today read “whites had no claim to land in South Africa” – statements like these take away one group of the rainbow nations rights to belong to South Africa. Is it any wonder then that the artist, which is to represent SA at the 57th Venice Biennale, Candice Breitz, chooses to live and work abroad?
Candice Breitz, born 1972 in Johannesburg, studied Fine Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg). After graduating, in 1993, she moved to America – where she continued her studies, receiving her Master’s degree in Art History at the University of Chicago and her doctoral at Columbia University (New York).
Currently she is a Professor of Fine Art at the Braunschweig University of Art (Berlin).
Although she has an impressive repertoire of exhibitions and publications one have to wonder if she is indeed the best candidate to represent South Africa today? She has lived longer abroad than in South Africa. Could they not find ANY suitable candidate that lives and works in South Africa to represent our art at the Biennale?
During 1994-8, her work focused on questions about gender and identity in South Africa. Examples of her early work includes “The Ghost series” (1994-6) and “Rainbow series” in which she questions commodity and gender.
She also created series in which she question commodities, trademarks and the art market (art as commodity), e.g. “My Twin” and “Painting by Numbers”. (1997).
In works that are more recent her art consist of video art. In “Working class hero” (2006) she explores modern peoples disillusion with believe systems and societies values as accepted status quo that needs to be re-evaluated.
Her art is most definitely Conceptual Artworks but very little of her South African identity can still be found in her thinking and creative process. In the current climate where many South African’s find themselves living abroad – perhaps she is the best choice, after all, to represent all those displaced South Africans since they can better relate with her way of thinking!
I, for one, am looking forward to seeing the artworks created for the Biennale! Make us proud!
