At the border post of Western art : the provisional "reaggregation" of Moshekwa Langa's art into the South African canon (original) (raw)

Image & Text : a Journal for Design, 2011

Abstract

When Moshekwa Langa's eponymous solo exhibition opened in Johannesburg in 1995, it was hailed as turning point in South African art as it appeared to mark the entry of the first black South African artist working within a neo-conceptualist rubric. Untrained and hailing from a rural locale, years earlier Langa's art would most likely have been deemed unprogressive or "traditional". Borrowing from Arnold van Gennep's (cited by Turner 1969) notion of 'reaggregation' - the final phase of a rite of passage, where the subject transcends the liminal phase, in this article I explore the shifts that facilitated Langa's provisional inclusion, while unpacking the manner in which his identity paradoxically served to ensure his liminal status. Olu Oguibe (2004) suggests that African artists can resist this position through acts of self-definition. Langa avoided this route; he was complicit in constructing his liminal identity. He challenged reaggregation via an ...

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