Eastern Cape art award promotes creative talent

By Patrick Burnett

The nine finalists of the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum Biennial have been announced, with the artists now competing for the grand prize of a solo exhibition in 2009.

Designed to promote artistic excellence in the Eastern Cape, an exhibition of work from the finalists, held between 19 June and 27 July, saw a mixed bag of work on display, including video, ceramics, painting, printmaking, sculpture, textiles and photography.
Of the nineteen artists selected for the exhibition, eight were short-listed as finalists. They are Kate Arthur, Linga Diko, George Kockott , Christine Maree, Marc Pradervand, Mxolisi Sapeta, Jessica Vandeleur and Lisa Walker.
Emma Taggart, the exhibition curator, in a presentation at the opening, said: “Art competitions play an important role in promoting art and are integral in an environment like South Africa’s where funding is hard to come by. These competitions push artists to produce ground-breaking work and act as creative platforms for artists to experiment and play.”
Following the closure of the exhibition on 27 July, the finalists will now be expected to submit a proposal to motivate why their work should be chosen for the award of a solo exhibition in 2009.
Marc Pradervand, one of the finalists, said he was originally from the Eastern Cape but had since lived in Cape Town and the United Kingdom before returning.
“It’s nice to be noticed quite soon,” he said.

His work on display at the exhibition consisted of three photographs of Sangoma initiatives in an early morning ceremony in the sea at Port St Johns on the Wild Coast. He said the photographs fell into the theme of children being put into positions of adulthood, while he had always been interested in Port St Johns as a place that was a forerunner of the new South Africa.

Looking forward to the finals, Pradervand said Eastern Cape artists “just do their own thing”. The province therefore produced good artists, who created art for the sake of creating it and not for the sake of commercial competitions.
Maree, another finalist, said being a finalist played an important part in getting her work “out there”.