GIPCA PRESENTS PRE-LIFE IN THE RUN-UP TO THE 2ND LIVE ART FESTIVAL

In anticipation of the Live Art Festival, the Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts (GIPCA) presents two Pre-LIFE events, introducing some of the themes around which the 2014 Festival has been curated. The Pre-LIFE events will take place on Thursday 14 and 21 August at Hiddingh Hall, UCT Hiddingh Campus.

Pre-LIFE 1 comprises visual presentations and a panel discussion around one of the core themes in the Live Art Festival: The Periphery as Threshold. Speakers will consider notions of periphery and centre – what these mean as concepts in society and then for artists working outside the gallery system. Does the periphery exist by choice, by design, by force or tacit exclusion?  These ideas, as well as ideas around fringe art production and traditional gallery systems, how artists may resist definition by the legitimised space and the limitations of spaces defined as alternative and otherwise, will be pursued. Panelists include Loyiso Mkize, Astrid Gebhardt, Gavin Krastin,Nompumelelo Mamqwathi Rakabe, Kirsty Cockerill and Jarrett James Erasmus, chaired by Jay Pather.

Pre-LIFE1 will take place on Thursday 14 August at 17:30 at Hiddingh Hall, University of Cape Town (UCT) Hiddingh Campus, Orange Street, Cape Town; and is free. Refreshments will be served from 17:00; no booking is necessary. For more information, contact the GIPCA office on 021 480 7156 or fin-gipca@uct.ac.za, or visit www.gipca.uct.ac.za.

NOTES TO EDITORS About the panellists: Kirsty Cockerill is currently Director of The New Church Museum, having been the Director of the AVA gallery and Collection Manager at Iziko South Africa National Gallery. Her passion for the development of cultural capital in South Africa motivates her involvement with projects that engage with public space, the development of emerging curators and professional practice in the visual arts arena.

Jarrett James Erasmus is a resident artist at Greatmore Studios and a member of Burning Museum collective. He graduated with a BFA from Rhodes University, was awarded the David Koloane Award from the Bag Factory Artist Studios and participated in a residency at Nafasi Art Space in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Erasmus’ work has social leanings that focus on the current state of society in a post-apartheid reality. He works mainly on a two-dimensional plane, but has recently moved towards performance, video and site specificity.

Nompumelelo Mamqwathi Rakabe is a multimedia artist, founder of BlackFossil Soul Creation and a curator. She is currently pursuing a post-graduate degree in Visual Art at the UNISA, and works in a freelance capacity for MOCCA Museum and Commune 1 Gallery. Her work has been showcased in various open spaces including the Greatmore Studios, Whizz ICT, Polokwane Art Gallery Women’s Journal Annual Exhibition, Limpopo Arts & Culture Association, UNISA, University of Limpopo and Haenertsburg Farm Gallery.

Gavin Krastin is an award-winning South African performance artist with an interest in the body’s representation, limitation and operation in alternative, layered spaces. His work is inspired by his immediate environment and the history embedded in its shifting socio-political climate. Apart from operating within conventional theatre, Krastin advocates the migration towards unconventional spaces where unknown risk factors are imminent. He has presented works at numerous festivals in South Africa and internationally, has lectured at Rhodes University (from where he obtained his MA) and UCT, and has worked with theFirst Physical Theatre Company.

Born in Butterworth, Loyiso Mkize is an artist and illustrator. After completing a diploma in graphic design, he launched a visual art company Loyiso Mkize Art (Pty). He illustrates the Supa Strikas monthly comic in You, Drum and Huisgenoot magazines.  Mkize’s subjects, generally African, explore the complex nature that makes up modern man, his environment, predisposition and culture. He has exhibited at The Framery and Avital galleries in Cape Town and in Johannesburg. In 2014, he travelled to New York and exhibited at a group exhibition funded by the Department of Trade and Industry.

Astrid Gebhardt graduated with a BA in Fine Arts and an Honours in Curatorship from UCT. She currently lives and works between Johannesburg and Cape Town, working predominantly with painting, but including sculptural installation and print media. She is particularly interested in the process of art making - makingeach work a celebration of obsessive compulsion and repetition.

About the Live Art Festival: The 2nd Live Art Festival runs from 27 August to 7 September 2014 and features over thirty-five works of innovation. The Festival brings together a range of artists from the fields of visual arts, dance, theatre, music, architecture and literature. Most works are collaborative and interdisciplinary, with artists from across South Africa as well as Switzerland, the United Kingdom, United States, Cameroon, Nigeria, Netherlands and Ghana. The Festival will take place in various spaces at UCT’s Hiddingh Campus, the Cape Town City Hall and several clubs in and around Green Point. Full programme available on www.gipca.uct.ac.za and bookings through www.webtickets.co.za.

About GIPCA: The University of Cape Town’s Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts (GIPCA) facilitates new collaborative and interdisciplinary creative research projects in the disciplines of Music, Dance, Fine Art, Drama, Creative Writing, Film and Media Studies. Interdisciplinarity is a key theme of the institute and projects are imbuedwith innovation, collaboration and dialogue with urbanism and community. GIPCA was launched in December 2008 with a substantial grant from Sir Donald Gordon, founder of Liberty Life. An Advisory Board comprising Heads of Departments of all Performing and Creative Arts Departments at UCT helps to shape contexts for the instigation and development of projects by students and staff, as well as a wide range of institutions and individuals outside the University.

GIPCA Director: Associate Professor Jay Pather

Chair of the GIPCA Board: Professor Sakhela Buhlungu

ISSUED BY: The Gordon Institute For Performing And Creative Arts (GIPCA)

CONTACT:

Samantha SaevitzonTEL: + 27 21 480 7156EMAIL: fin-gipca@uct.ac.za / sam.saevitzon@uct.ac.za