Balancing act: An investigation of the in-between space used by selected contemporary artists in South Africa

[摘要] After endless contemplation on the idea of 'word and image’, the following expressionof J.W.T Mitchell in Word and Image (1996: 56) brought insight:'[W]ord and image’… a pair of terms whose relations open a space ofintellectual struggle, historical investigation, and artistic/critical practice. Ouronly choice is to explore this space (own emphasis).I shifted my position from the forlorn act of peeling to one of creative exploration. Notnecessarily exploring the specific space between word and image, but rummaging 'thespace between’; always hovering amid opposites. This space provides an opportunity toconfront and debate the many issues that stem from the relations formed in its fluidity.It is a space that informs my thinking. It is a space of conversation. I see not only mywriting, but also the art that I scrutinize as conversation. My conversation is captured inthe linear structure of this thesis, but the conversation of art is dynamic. It is informaland flexible – following not one path, offering no answer, giving the potential at eachmoment for surprises and transformation. The idea is to ponder contemporary art’sdialogue, the manipulators thereof and the indispensable factors constituting thisnotion: space, grammar, medium, criticism.The notion of dialogue assumes a listener, a participant, an audience. But who is thisaudience with whom ideas are conversed, and what language do you (presumably) useto communicate the necessary? I have chosen to investigate these questions, thepurpose and plan of art, with relation to a selected group of artists: an individual, TerryKurgan and a collective – Stephen Hobbs, Marcus Neustetter and Kathryn Smith,known as The Trinity Session.

[发布机构] University of the Witwatersrand