Artists exhibiting at Johannesburg’s Kaross gallery have expressed what the new South African phenomenon of load-shedding means to them. And in some cases, it’s darkly (or electrifyingly) personal.
Close your eyes as you pass Damien Grivas’s interpretation of the shedding of a load. The subject of the photograph is literally him taking the power crisis into his own hands.
Drops of white paint hang suggestively on Grivas’s gilt frame. Although Grivas admits the piece is ‘a bit whimsicalâ€, he says the work uses satire to convey the nation’s frustration and need for control.
Also on show is a conceptual piece by Grivas called Tomorrow There Will Be Less — a jet-black board with the title slowly flashing in white neon above it. Darkness falls as the light slowly fades out.
Grivas says he does not see the message purely in terms of electricity — as the nation confronts a growing food crisis and escalating fuel prices, ‘there will be less clean water, clean air, food and oilâ€, he warns.
Ranelle Rampastad reflects the growing fear in some quarters that our land is going backwards. Back to Basics is a photograph of an old copper and wire farm gate. Rampastad questions whether we are moving back to a more rough-hewn past — ‘getting out of the car and pushing our electric gatesâ€.
An Aliza Levi photograph shows a suburban kid in the dark, a TV glowing behind him and a gun in his hand. It is as if the child is trying to scare off the encroaching gloom.
Tucked in one corner of the gallery is a glittering angel with a Ken doll face bathed in light, which artist and curator Brian Webber describes as something emerging from a darker past.
‘The angel was a gift from a father to a son who did not turn out quite how he expected,†says Webber ‘I called it Apology — I put it up here to shed a personal load.â€
Artists Load Shedding runs until May 21 at Kaross Gallery, 68 6th St Parkhurst, Johannesburg