Strike down capitalism: dump your old art

By Patrick Burnett

You’ve heard of retreading old tyres, but how about taking your unwanted pieces of art down to the local dealership for a bit of recycling?
While you’re doing it you would also be making a statement on the evils of capitalism and the selfishness of art that hides out on the walls of private collections.
A group of Johannesburg artists have launched a “creative
recycling” project that will take privately owned art and recondition it into public works – an idea that if nothing else has stoked debate in the art world. The Joburg Art Bin, the concept of a group of artists known as Empty Office and consisting of Landi Raubenheimer, Paul Cooper and Brenden Grey, and supported by The Bag Factory artist studio, is being described by organisers
as a “gesture of resistance to the privatization of contemporary art”.
The collective recently issued a call to private collectors to dump works of art between 18 July and 2 August. A debate on the concept was also held on July 4.
The concept of retreading old art has raised concerns ranging from a feeling that the project is
a tongue-in-cheek indulgence, to worries about the implications of tampering with art that is located in historical, social and political contexts.

But the organisers have explained their efforts in the following terms:

“The premise behind the project is to problematize the fetishization, instrumentalization, commoditization and privatization of art by generating public art from the physical detritus of privately owned pieces which have been destroyed by their owners.”
They hope to explore how the “meaning and form of a privately owned art object transforms when it is reworked by another artist and re-imagined in a public context”.
The proposal is that the recycled art will be used in a series of public art works to be installed in central Johannesburg in preparation for Joburg Art Week and the Joburg Art Fair 2009. Artists will work in collaboration with those who drop off work.

Grey said the project was asking questions about why artists made the work they did and who saw that work and was interested in the dialogue and debate around these questions. He said work was not being defaced but recycled and reconstructed. The Bag Factory education officer Bronwyn Lace said a panel discussion had been held on July 4 to discuss the project. “It was a heated debate and no clear answers were reached...The debate did raise many questions though as to the validity of art in the public realm, whether much of it is truly transformative in nature, the reasons for collecting etc.” Lace said some works had already been deposited but was not able to give details on what would be done with them. Antoinette Murdoch, CEO of the Joburg Art Bank, which has ropped off some art works, said about 10 pieces had been handed over. She said while it was “an interesting idea”, the bank would not be involved in re-purposing the work and saw it more as a convenient way “to get rid of what you don’t want and re-purpose something”. “If it does nothing else but to generate a lot of debate then that is fabulous because I’m so sick and tired of people not debating. If new voices can be heard and people are saying what they think then I think that’s fabulous.”