Johannesburg offers a variety of creative spaces and places to visit. Plan your week around these must-see art exhibitions, events, and creative spaces. For a full guide to what’s on in Joburg, check out our online events calendar and subscribe to our newsletter guide to Joburg published every Thursday morning.
Here are the art events we recommend checking out this week.
NEW EXHIBITION: From the Magazine at The Gallery
UNTIL END OF AUG See the works by Cape Town based artists Anico Mostert and Nano le Face in a beautifully exhibition, beautifully curated by Joburg-based artist Balekane Legoabe at The Gallery in 44 Stanley. The work on show includes figurative paintings and drawings on paper. Both artists approach their work with their own version of quirky figures and interesting colours, encouraging a fun conversation between their particular styles. The Gallery is open 09:00-16:00, Sat, Sun 09:00-15:00.
LIVE DRAWING SESSION: Odette Graskie at Berman Contemporary
LIVE DRAWING SESSION SAT JUL 30 11:00 Curated by Morgan Kunhardt with artist Odette Graskie this is an interactive performance that asks you to come and celebrate your mask-free face in the artist’s portrait drawing session. Odette Graskie is known for her signature line work in pen. You will be drawn in this style. These portraits are set to become part of Odette’s large collection of drawings that will be used in her new body of work and participants also get a limited-edition print of the artist’s work.
The event runs alongside the gallery’s current exhibition The Annual Winter Show (open until Aug 6) featuring young and mid-career artists including Amogelang Maepa, DuduBloom More, Ingrid Bolton, Odette Graskie, Robyn Denny and Stefan Blom. Takes place from 11:00-14:00, walk-ins encouraged. Find Berman Contemporary at the corner of Barry Hertzog and Napier Rd, Richmond
EXHIBITION LAUNCH: Practices of Self-fashioning at Goethe-Institut
EXHIBITION OPENING EVENT THU JUL 28 18:30 Goethe-Institut presents the launch of its latest exhibition Practices of Self-Fashioning curated by Nkgopoleng Moloi with a performative response by Tandile Mbatsha. This exhibition draws on movement and queer theories to explore how space, environment and movement affect queer identities. The nexus of the inquiry is the Kewpie Collection —the personal photographic archive of Kewpie, a hairdresser and performer who lived in Cape Town’s District Six —housed at the GALA Queer Archive in Johannesburg. In the spirit of Kewpie who noted “[My father] …wanted me to be his genuine normal son, whereas I am now to say his normal daughter.” Self Fashioning speaks to the agency one has in creating one’s own identity, deciding on who one is and how one is presented in the world.
This project is part of Goethe’s Young Curators Incubator 2022 programme, in partnership with the History of Art Department at the Wits School of the Arts. Goethe-Institut, 119 Jan Smuts Ave, Parkwood, open 09:00-18:00, Sat 09:00-14:00. Closed Sun. Read more here.
Walkabout of WJK @ WAM & Wits 100: William Kentridge artworks from WAM collections with Special Projects Curator Fiona Rankin-Smith
WALKABOUT SAT JUL 30, 12:00 Visit the Wits Art Museum (WAM) to hear insight from the museum’s Special Projects Curator Fiona Rankin-Smith, who curated this exciting exhibition of works by William Kentridge.
WIts university’s holdings of work by William Kentridge span the artist’s four-decade career. The exhibition includes over 20 drawings, etchings, and screenprints dating from 1980 to 2022. A few artworks with special connections to the university have been loaned, including an exclusive viewing of the 11-minute edited projection of Oh To Believe in Another World, Kentridge’s latest film which is based on Shostakovich’s 10th Symphony and commissioned by the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra in Switzerland. Also on display are model components and puppets used to create the film. WAM is open to the public from Tuesday to Saturday, from 10:00 – 16:00. This exhibition closes on 13 August 2022. Read more here.