Kin Bentley In Line: A serious row about art

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

A serious row about art

After years of sailing very close to the wind for my political outspokenness - first as an opponent of apartheid, then of the ANC's ineptitude and corruption - little did I know that the most vitriolic attacks on me in the media would come as a result of my views on, of all things, fine art. As noted in earlier postings of my media clippings, a concerted campaign to undermine my freedom to express my views on art as a reviewer, was waged by certain art academics. Now, six years later, it is quite interesting to reflect on a chapter in that sorry saga. It started with a small review buried on the arts pages of the Herald in Port Elizabeth on April 7, 2006 . . . (To read these articles, hold down shift and left click and they come up larger. Click again on the image and it gets larger still.)

My review of the Biennial Exhibition at the NMM Art Museum, which caused all the trouble

This review of a book on San art appeared in the Herald's TGIF supplement on July 7, 2006

Maureen Quin, one of the Eastern Cape's foremost sculptors, had this letter published in the Herald on July 13. I don't think I have ever met her and this was totally unsolicited by me

I was doing these reviews in the mornings, since my work as a sub-editor and paginator on the Herald meant I only started my day job (which was a night job) at 3.30pm. Tossie Theron, owner of the then Cuyler Street Gallery, was a hard task master. She arranged exhibitions fortnightly, and I did my best to both preview and review them, as I did most of the other shows in the city. This one appeared on July 20. I was blissfully of what was around the corner

Encountered earlier in the NMM Art Museum newsletter (see earlier postings), Jeanne Wright, a local academic, took out the cudgels again and laid into me with this letter in the Herald of July 26, 2006

Well, it seemed to blow over, and another exhibition at Tossie's gallery was reviewed. This appeared on August 3, 2006

Then again, out of the blue, came this lengthy letter from the former director of the King George VI Art Gallery (now the NMM Art Museum), Clayton Holliday, which appeared in the Herald on August 11. Again, this was totally unsolicited. The headline reads: Reviews help readers assess own response to art. The piece continues below

The concluding part of Clayton Holliday's article

Then this from the gallery's then spokeswoman, Sandy Thackeray, on August 16

And so, the excitement over, I got back to reviewing. This appeared in the Herald on August 17

I even ventured back into the NMM Art Museum. This also appeared on August 17

This appeared on August 31

And this on September 14, 2006

This appeared in the Herald on September 28. It concludes below

The final part of the review of the Hepburn show.

I kept writing reviews until about the end of 2010, at which point I was ousted by new leadership on the paper. I don't know if they resented paying me the small amounts I earned for writing this stuff (which barely covered petrol costs) or whether they succumbed to pressure from what I can only call a feminist lobby desperate to ingratiate themselves with the new political elite, as self-serving and inept as they might be. Where has that left art in PE? Well since I stopped previewing and reviewing art, very little now appears in the paper. Wright has produced a handful of reviews which are generally bland and boring. Hardly the stuff to get people off their butts and into the galleries.

No comments:

Post a Comment

About this blog

This blog has morphed from one thing to the next, and will continue to do so.

The latest offerings are of a political nature, though the main role of the blog is to put online scanned versions of my sketches, which make up the bulk of the first part.

* Earlier, I returned to a project I suspended on September 12, 2011, namely posting clilppings from my writings in the Herald newspaper in Port Elizabeth. From those you'll have gleaned that I was first prevented from writing political letters and articles critical of the ANC government.

Then my art reviews came under fire - from the hallowed halls of academia, no less.

* Before this, I posted a series of book reviews and an account of recent travels.

* There is also a short autobiographical novel, Little K and the Big World.

Below is a summary of what was posted before that. (NB. To view pictures larger, hold down "shift" and left click on the mouse. Click again to see it even larger.)

* During the 27 years I have worked as a journalist, I have kept random samples of my work. Initially, when I joined the Evening Post in Port Elizabeth in 1984, I kept a scrapbook, so those first years – when the anti-apartheid struggle really started hotting up – are fairly well covered.

By the time I joined the Eastern Province Herald in about 1988, I’d stopped collecting my stories, but I have one article I wrote that year which I think captures the mood of those dark times.

During two years in the UK – 1990 and 1991– when I worked as a correspondent for the SA Morning Newspaper group, I kept no cuttings. The same applies to the early 1990s when, back on the Herald, I covered the gradual transition to democracy. After the April 27, 1994, first non-racial elections, I moved to the sub-editing department, where I have been ever since.

When Robert Mugabe started his crackdown in 2000, I took up the pen again in a big way – and was lucky to have been given space by then editor Ric Wilson to vent my spleen in the Herald. In between, I wrote numerous book reviews and art crits, which balance out the offerings. I began this section with the more recent stuff, from 2000 onwards, and will take up this project again in 2012.

* Having all but exhausted my sketches on this blog - though I have yet to post pictures of my paintings and a few carvings - I thought I would digress into other areas of interest, and use a few of my photographs to illustrate them.

As Thabo Mbeki and the ANC set about rubbishing everything to do with our colonial past, I found myself rather cherishing what our ancestors had done here, notwithstanding my obvious detestation of the apartheid system which, had Jannie Hofmeyr lived to succeed Smuts after the Second World War, may not have happened. It is interesting to note that the National Party came to power in 1948 despite polling 100 000 fewer votes than the United Party. This was the effect of "loading" the urban constituencies.

Anyway, the East Cape has seen a fair share of interesting history down the centuries, some of which is covered here.

There is also history in stamps and envelopes. A few years back I went to a Port Elizabeth antique shop in the hopes I could acquire some old SA stamps from my youth. At first things looked bleak. The dealer only had posh albums of expensive stamps. But wait, he said, I do have a couple of black bin bags cluttering up the place somewhere, full of useless old stamps and envelopes. He gave them to me for about R100, if I recall correctly.

From these I have made several postage stamp-based artworks, photos of which I'll be posting, eventually. I also discovered a treasure trove of envelopes which had been posted to the City Treasurer of the PE Municipality as well as to the Divisional Council and another whole batch sent by dealers around South Africa to the Ford Motor Company in PE. These all date from the early 1960s, so we're talking 50 odd years ago. Each envelope tells a story.

* Initially I started this blog to illustrate how I learnt the art of drawing, after many years of toil, and how, once learnt, this skill has accompanied me throughout my life.

At each step, since about the mid-1970s, I have, where possible, made drawings that are often a more telling record than any photographs.

You will find a plethora of styles and techniques, but the bottom line – forgive the pun – is an attempt to get at the visual truth. As we go along, I explain each work and how I came to do it – that is, where I remember precisely when they were made.

* Remember, as this is a blog, the story starts from the first post and works its way upwards, as it were.

Click on the images to see them in a larger format. If you want an image to fill your computer screen, press F11. Press the same key to escape.

My thanks, again, go to my son, Douglas, who was just 16 when he helped me put together the header for this blog. Most of the more creative ideas - and all the technical expertise - in this regard were his.

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

A serious row about art

No comments:

Post a Comment

Links

About Me