Banks don’t like risks, but this year’s FNB-Vita Art Prize winner is the exception, writes Brenda Atkinson
If controversy increases exponentially with an event’s public success, then the recently re-launched FNB-Vita Art Prize is on the right track to the artworld jugular.
Last week’s announcement of perverse performance artist Steven Cohen as the competition’s winner caused so many pursed lips you might have thought Cohen had stuck his trademark dildos up the bottoms of most people present.
Cohen was immediately beseiged with comment both explicitly addressed and whispered in face-brick corners. Some people joked that he should bank his R20 000 cheque before it was withdrawn, while others went so far as to intimate that the vote had been rigged.
There are a few reasons why Cohen’s victory is controversial, not least of which is his performance repertoire. This ranges from douching gallery walls with blood to sabotaging bridal fares with his own brand of sartorial strategy. His performance pieces for the exhibition have titles like Dog, Faggot, and Ugly Girl, are performed by a persona called Menorah, and most often involve bodily matter out of place.
Put this together with the classical cool of William Kentridge (his Vita piece is based on Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse), the incisive social commentary of Lisa Brice, or the measured minimalism of Siemon Allen, and you have a clear case of incomprehension as to why the prettiest work didn’t win.
Kentridge, who won the Vita Award in 1993, was apparently the public favourite on a show that, this year, does its organisers and sponsors proud. Restructured by Sandton Civic Gallery curator Natasha Fuller to run along the lines of Britain’s hyper-hip Turner Prize, the competition seems to be doing its job as a stimulus to local artworld debate and production.
Both Fuller and FNBVita director Philip Stein are adamantly supportive of Cohen’s work. According to Fuller, although FNB were at one point concerned about opprobrium – and possible financial loss – from their more conservative clients, this never became an issue.
“I was prepared to fight against this,” says Fuller, “because we had Kendell Geers’s cum-stained centrespread on the show a few years ago, and that didn’t cause more than a ripple. But in the end there was no argument at all.”
Before I could say a word to Stein regarding this piece, he broke into genuine praise about Cohen’s wit and satirical turn of phrase, squashing any suspicions of neo-conservative treachery. Stein, who agrees that the work is “provocative by its nature” is nonetheless emphatic about his “delight” at the panel’s choice. “Cohen was chosen enthusiastically and unanimously,” says Stein, “and I am personally enthusiastic about his work.”
Again, despite rumours to the contrary, Stein confirms that FNB has already started discussion with Fuller regarding next year’s event, having committed to its further financial sustenance.
As judge Frank Ledimo puts it, FNB Vita, like the Turner Prize, exists to promote art that defines the sharp edge of local artistic production. For him, as for judges Bongi Dhlomo, Okwui Enwezor, Kendell Geers and Anthea Bristowe, the merit in Cohen’s work is in the artist’s willingness to take aesthetic, and very personal, risks. And the merit in FNB’s sponsorship is in the bank’s willingness to take those risks too, to publicly support work that interrogates and challenges and even shames. Without this spirit, we will never have a vital and critical visual arts culture.
Read Brenda Atkinson’s Q&A with Steven Cohen on ZA@Play, the eM&G’s arts website, at http://www.mg.co.za/mg/art