Loading

Guilds & Unions

Joachim Schönfeldt2015

la Biennale di Venezia - Biennale Arte 2015

la Biennale di Venezia - Biennale Arte 2015
Venice, Italy

Joachim Schönfeldt
Born in Pretoria, South Africa, in 1958.
He lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Joachim Schönfeldt has long been concerned with the relationship between objects and oral discourse. After graduating from the University of Witwatersrand, Schönfeldt began his artistic career as a curator and researcher of historical African art before becoming a full-time artist in 1988. After he helped to establish one of Johannesburg’s first artist collaboratives, Fordsburg Artists Studios (also called The Bag Factory) in 1991, he developed a continuing interest in collaborative and interdisciplinary modes of production and exchange. Using the African art object as a starting point, Schönfeldt’s practice articulates a broader investigation into the role of narrative in African culture and the everyday lives of its peoples. In effect, the work itself is an outcome of how objects intervene in discourse, whether they are used in verbal narratives or animated by language itself.
The shifting context of the cultural artifact demonstrates the complexity of Schönfeldt’s artistic project. Notions of authenticity and contemporaneity are considered in relation to African history, the medium through which objects continue to communicate and form their essential value. Often exploring a specific working methodology, Schönfeldt animates these objects by liberating them from their conventional use. Where text is absent, the history of Africa’s oral society is constructed from found and sourced objects, implements, ruins, and so on. Negating the anthropological approach to the unique artifact as a fragment of the past, Schönfeldt uses symbols from the iconography of a reimagined Pan-African identity, in one instance modifying animals’ heads to signify the unity of a metaphorical nationalism.
Guilds & Unions is a multifaceted project that is centered on the enactment of civic activity. In keeping with the artist’s critical interest in the social structures that inform the production, distribution, and meaning of the object, Schönfeldt explores the work spaces and activities of local craftsmen. Using audio, visual, and spatial devices, this project will map the processes, environments, and labor of craftsmen in two areas of Johannesburg, the Alexandra and Marlboro Industrial townships. The unfolding of the notion of guilds and unions, through drawings and videos, will spill into live musical and ceremonial performances and interventions, actively questioning the role of national identity and tradition.

Details

  • Title: Guilds & Unions
  • Creator: Joachim Schönfeldt
  • Date Created: 2015
  • Rights: Courtesy the artist, Photo by Isabella Balena; Courtesy: la Biennale di Venezia
  • Medium: Performance

Get the app

Explore museums and play with Art Transfer, Pocket Galleries, Art Selfie, and more

Flash this QR Code to get the app
Google apps