In collaboration with Dr Thembinkosi Goniwe, Bhavisha Panchia and the Umhlabathi Photography Collective,  Bag Factory Artists’ Studios is delighted to present

Listening to the Echoes of Matsemela Manaka

2-Day Symposium and Exhibition Opening: 9 - 10 February 2023

 

Listening to the Echoes of Matsemela Manaka is a programme which assembles different perspectives and reflections to revisit and celebrate the work and contribution of Manaka’s seminal 1987 publication, Echoes of African Art: A Century of Art in South Africa. Manaka was a dynamic figure: a painter, poet, playwright, educator and stage director whose creative output was dedicated to the shaping of South African culture and Black artistic dignity.

The symposium and parallel programme centres on the book, Echoes of African Art, as the only example that focuses on the history of South African art by Black artists written by a Black author. Keeping in mind that memory is our heritage, this symposium is aimed at keeping the heritage of Black artists alive, while further advancing their contributions to future generations of artists. Over two days, invited artists and scholars will ruminate on the legacy of the publication and its contribution to contemporary South African Art History.

Organised by Bag Factory and conceived by Dr Goniwe, the symposium stems from a response to the dearth of writing and publishing on the work of Black South African artists. Its aim is to theorise, contextualise and critique them as a worthy archive, and considers the impact of black creative thinkers who are now pioneering ancestors in the black intellectual practice of reading and writing (on) visual art. Are their writings not an intellectual tradition in the yet-to-be-established black visual studies? Thus, to study such black archives is also to study and appreciate the significance of this black intellectual tradition and its authors, who contribute to the unfolding historiography of South African art histories and visual cultures.

Turning our ears back to this historical document and the context of its making provides an opportunity to gauge the nuanced impact of such a creative and intellectual endeavour from Manaka, an observer of South Africa’s Black visual artists and their creative outputs. The century of South African Art produced by Black artists that Manaka refers to is one way of establishing the continued expression of Black artists in Southern Africa.

 

Symposium Programme: Listening to the Echoes of Matsemela Manaka

 Friday, 9 February 2024, Bag Factory Artist Studios

Arrivals: 09:-00- 09:45

09:45 –10:00       Opening Remarks: Thembinkosi Goniwe and Bhavisha Panchia

10:00 ­– 11:30     Panel: Biography and Recollection: Sibuyisa uMkhulu bringing back the elders

12:00 – 13:30      Panel: Manaka’s Theatre and Poetry

14:30 – 16:00      Panel:  The Book

 

 

Saturday 10 February 2024,  Umhlabathi Collective

 09:45                   Opening Remarks: Thembinkosi Goniwe &  Introduction to Umhlabathi: Andrew Tshabangu

10:00 – 12:00      Panel: Reading Perspectives/ Reflections on Key Themes of the Book

12:00 –12:15        Vote of thanks by Thembinkosi Goniwe

12:15 -                  Opening of exhibition Sibuyisa uMkhulu: bringing back the elders

 

Venues’ Information

Bag Factory Artist Studios (Directions in link)

10 Mahlathini St, Newtown, Johannesburg, 2001

 

 

Umhlabathi Collective (Directions in link)

2 Helen Joseph St, Newtown, Johannesburg, 2001

 

 

The Bag Factory Art Legacy programme and 2023 Symposium are supported by the National Arts Council.