When I visited Venice eighteen years ago it was overrun with migrants. The experience left a vivid and lasting impression. It also made the invitation to the 60th Venice Biennial all the more ironic, considering the theme "Foreigners Everywhere." Unsurprisingly, numerous pavilions delved into the ongoing impact of colonialism. As for my highlights? They are the Netherlands Pavilion – Ced’art Tamasala – which
Margins Eclectica Contemporary is pleased to announce the opening of Margins, a group show which runs alongside three adjacent curatorial collaborations taking place in the gallery throughout August and September to celebrate Womxn’s Month. As a womxn run and led gallery based in South Africa, August is a focal month in Eclectica Contemporary’s calendar. Our intentions, as a gallery and as a team,
Alice Toich: The relationship between a female painter and her models As part of our Womxn’s Month program, Eclectica Contemporary is pleased to announce the opening of Alice Toich: The relationship between a female painter and her models. Alice Toich opens a conversation honouring the relationship between the artist and model in her work and historically. I have been reflecting on the very personal relationship I
Ke Namile As part of our Womxn's Month program, Eclectica Contemporary is pleased to announce the opening of Ke Namile, a group show curated by one of our invited collaborators, LegakwanaLeo Makgekgenene. They have brought together 7 artists which include: Malwande Mthethwa, Shana-Lee Ziervogel, Elijah Ndoumbé, Lamb of Lemila, Ranji Mangcu and Rona to present a show which confronts gender binarism and
Boni & Wes: Moving backwards is still moving As part of our Womxn’s Month program, Eclectica Contemporary is pleased to announce the opening of Boni & Wes: Moving backwards is still moving, which presents an interrogation of space, intimacy, and repetition. Moving backwards still still moving functions as a documentation of the unremitted fluctuation of movement and stillness within the universe, sameness and
Latitudes Art Fair 2020 Latitudes Art Fair 2020 is now live and Eclectica Contemporary is excited to show works by Ofentse Seshabela, Nina Holmes, Hussein Salim and Ley Mboramwe. Latitudes is your new online market space to explore and buy contemporary art from Africa. With a constantly changing, curated selection of art from the continent and the diaspora,
Disturbing the Stereotypes - KWAAI Exhibition 2020 Art goes beyond mere entertainment – it is an ancient way of expressing who we are and what we stand for that goes back to the first time that humans left their marks on the walls of caves or fashioned forms out of the earth. Art captures and expresses different
Tones brings together ideas that have germinated, growing silently and carefully, over the past few months. Since the beginning of 2020, or perhaps long before, the world has been in various states of flux, requiring a change of pace, a different dynamic and altered means of interaction. Thus, as we shift in tone to new possibilities, acknowledging the tensions and sounds of strain, and
Mimouni El Houssaine lives and teaches fine art in Montpellier although he travels constantly between the two Mediterranean shores of Morocco and Europe. These constant coming and goings are reflected on his canvases in a game of symbols, spattered written texts and horizons in perspective. Mimouni's work weaves the intricate dialect of yearning for other shores, spurned on by the desire
Elsewhere - Hussein Salim Hussein Salim is no stranger to travel, finding new environments, adapting to new living spaces. Having traveling extensively since leaving Khartoum, Sudan in the 1980s, his experiences have layered his work with a dense patterning of memory, reminiscence of place and intricate symbolisms influenced by different cultural contexts. A poem titled The Importance of Elsewhere by
