Senzeni Marasela is one of South Africa's most prolific contemporary artists. Her practice spans more than 20 years and finds expression through a variety of media including relief prints, photography, fabric works, durational performance and often a combination of these. She uses autobiography as a starting point of her work to reflect on the social, economic and historical positioning of women in her own life particularly her mother as well as historical personages such as Sara Baartman. The exhibition at the Johannesburg Art Gallery will consist of a selection of the works that were presented in the 2021 highly successful exhibition at Zeitz Mocaa in Cape Town titled Waiting for Gebane.
Senzeni Marasela, Waiting for Gebane, Johannesburg Art Gallery
Waiting for Gebane is a latest iteration works that deal with self-insertion which started with the Theodora Comes to Joburg series. The works speak of the invisibility of black women. Their invisibility is informed in part by their positionality whose work is the least valued such as informal traders, cleaners, mothers, community-builders, prayer women, care-givers etc. This marginality is further reinforced by patriarchal norms. And yet it is on the backs of these women, literally, that society is built. It is worth noting that the dresses in which Marasela enacted the six-year performance are colloquially known as “makoti”. UMakoti is a term that denotes either a newly wedded woman or a daughter-in-law, a designation that carries with it social expectations of dutiful service, a demure countenance and obedience. Waiting or Gebane is also a meditation on the obligation that black women, and in particular rural women, are forced into due to the migrant labour system as well as the piety and servitude that is often expected of them without ever considering what they might want
Senzeni Marasela, Waiting for Gebane (installation view), Johannesburg Art Gallery
Works like that of Marasela prefigure the attitudes that have surfaced in recent years, by younger, urban women, who are resisting these historically imposed and somewhat exploitative demands for stoicism which are embodied by slogans such as “wathint’ abafazi wathint’ imbokodo” (you strike a woman you strike a rock) and “mosadi o tshwara thipa ka bogaleng (a woman holds a knife by its sharp end).
Opening:
Sunday 19 June
14:00 – 18:00
Johannesburg Art Gallery
Panel discussion:
Thursday 23 June
16:00 – 18:00
Johannesburg Art Gallery
Live stream: https://www.facebook.com/JoburgCulture