I was in Berlin when New York artist Hank Willis Thomas’ show ‘All Things Being Equal’ opened at the Goodman Cape, and so I missed his walkabout, and it was only this week, as the exhibition draws to a close that I made it over there. I’m so glad I did. In spite of its incendiary themes of racism, the work is cool, very considered, and witty, and I will write more about it soon.
Hank Willis Thomas
All Things Being Equal 2010
Polished aluminium
104 x 194 cm
Several of the works were manufactured here through the Goodman Gallery – like the key phrase which is also the title of the show All Things Being Equal. This highly desirable piece is cast in gleaming aluminium, and hand finished to the same immaculate degree of perfection one expects to find in a luxury Italian car. Kendell Geers stated recently that it is now possible to fabricate artworks in South Africa which are the equal of anywhere else in the world, and Thomas’ exhibition definitely proves this point.
Art in America
I received an email this morning with advance PDFs of a four page feature in which South African Art Now is reviewed alongside Okwui Enwezor and Chika Okeke-Agula’s Contemporary African Art since 1985 to appear soon in Art in America. So exciting! Look out for the issue with this cover.
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