jozi art:lab

Susanne Schleyer/Michael J. Stephan (Germany)
Photo and sound installation

Stephan Erasmus (South Africa)
Sculpture and book art

Saskia Vredefeld (Netherlands)
"Arme blanken, de nieuwe onderklasse van Zuid Afrika"
documentary film

Indra Wussow (jozi art:lab)
Curator

3rd November 2010 - 30th January 2011
jozi art:lab, Johannesburg

17th February - 25th March 2011
NWU Gallery in Potchefsstroom

30 photos, black and white Baryt prints, 60x90 cm
sound scape of interview fragments and original sound material
sculptures and artist books

For outsiders it is hard to believe that in South Africa with its history of white supremacy Whites became impoverished or even had been poor for generations. Already in the 1920s there were many "Poor Whites" and this issue was politically addressed. To empower those at the expense to the majority of the country was one of the principles of the Apartheid regime until 1994, a task that failed to succeed. Today more than half a million white people can’t feed themselves. This development has many reasons. This problem is ignored however– ignored in a country, in which most of the capital and wealth are owned by the white minority and most of the black people are still living in poverty.

"Poor Whites" or "white trash", as they are called not only in South Africa, live outside of towns in squatter-camps. These places are named "Maranata" or "Eagles Nest" – but no eagle would get lost in such forgotten place. These people live in shacks and old caravans, clean water and electricity are rare.

At two of those lost places Susanne Schleyer and Michael J. Stephan improvised a studio and asked the contributors to stand in front of a "white wall" to portrait them there. Many of them are dressed in clothes they usually wear at church on Sundays. The artists didn’t encourage them to present themselves in a special pose or position.
The portraits include interviews. The interviews were conducted together with the Afrikaans artist Stephan Erasmus, who worked out his own interpretation of Afrikaaner identity, about loss, about guilt and redemption and how Afrikanners find their role in a new South Africa. His sculptures and artist books, he created in this process are part of this show.

In the interviews contributors were asked questions about their lives, their living circumstances, their wishes for their future. Notable: Even if they didn’t believe, that God would prove them, they never felt responsible for the situation they are in. On the contrary they called many reasons, why their situation was so desperate – especially the "blacks" are constantly blamed for their plight. They accused them not to offer them any help and forget themselves the fact that the former political system of Apartheid offered only little welfare for the majority of the South African people. In the squatter-camps there aren’t any "poor blacks". In this social landscape you are still discovering separation and intolerance.

Susanne Schleyer: "We looked into their faces, which seem to be from another time. We decided not to photograph them in the degrading misery and chaos. They didn’t expect that, because all their life they had been seen and portrayed like losers, like "White Trash". We took them out of this context, which determines their life. We put them in front of the "White Wall", because we didn’t want to abuse them, because we were looking in their faces and in the pictures for something – and we found what we all own: Proud and Dignity".

Indra Wussow (Curator): "As curator of the show I was very much interested in showing social transformation by scrutinizing one particular group of the South African society. To bring the Afrikaans artist Stephan Erasmus and the German artists Susanne Schleyer and Michael J. Stephan together meant to offer two completely different perspectives of the topic, seen from the inside of the society as well as from outsiders. The art show "Bitter Fruit" gives evidence to the fact that the Freedom Charta is still a mission for the new dispensation in South Africa and how many obstacles and prejudices have to overcome on its way into being."

bitter fruit - bittervrug