Friday, September 17, 2010

O.K. So no more travelling for a while.

I got back into my apartment after the long flight back from London via Dubai at 6.30 p.m. on the Saturday before last, and by 7.30 p.m. I was in the Africa Café, having dinner with Emma Bedford, Johnnetta Cole, director of the Museum of African Art in Washington and chief curator Chris Kreamer. Powerhouse Johnnetta had also flown in that day and was actually leaving again the next – her trip had been cut short by an invitation for Tuesday from Michelle Obama, but today she and Chris have had a tour of the SANG ‘Pierneef to Gugulective’ show with Riaison Naidoo. An excellent way to get an overview of South African art.

Mary Sibande and Mustafa Maluka at the SANG

It’s a week of curators. On Thursday it’s dinner with Colin Richards, Penny Siopis, Rory Bester and Okwui Enwezor. Okwui is making a start on a new show of South African photography for the New York Institute of Contemporary Photography. I tell Okwui I have recently refused an invitation from Performa to be on a panel with him in New York in October because I won’t be there then.

“Why don’t you participate by Skype?’ he says. ‘I recently delivered a whole lecture at the Tate Modern by Skype’. Trying to answer questions from a well informed New York audience while staring at a screen? The idea is totally unnerving.

Saturday is the 9th anninversary of 9/11, and at Kathryn Smith’s serialworks, forensic artist William Scarbrough is opening a new show, entitled 'The Forgotten'. A faded newspaper column tells the story of a terrorist attack which demolished two gas towers in Brooklyn earlier on that fateful day … television news footage of the time tells the story of this event which soon became overshadowed by the attack on the Twin Towers.

William Scarbrough’s ‘The Forgotten’ (video detail)

‘The Forgotten’ (installation detail)

There are eerie photographs of the reconstructed photographs of the dead. Scarbrough’s presentation is masterly.

Definitely worth the trip up the four flights of stairs to serialworks.