PAPER
with commisioned writings by:
TOMKE BRAUN
NOLAN OSWALD DENNIS
ZARA JULIUS
ZAYAAN KHAN
MAHRET IFEOMA KUPKA
LINDIWE MNGXITAMA
MAGNUS ELIAS ROSENGARTEN
KATHY-ANN TAN
Soil conversations - reflections & contemplations
Translations (all texts EN/DE): Yemisi Babatola
Installation shots of the exhibition in Berlin: Nihad Nino Pušija
in Johannesburg: Mvelo Midoli Antonia Mahlangu
Installation shots of the exhibition in Berlin: Nihad Nino Pušija
in Johannesburg: Mvelo Midoli Antonia Mahlangu
Soil Conversations - a Soliloquy
Nisha Merit
I started to appreciate this word or rather act over the past two years quite a lot - soliloquy - a monologue addressed to oneself, thoughts spoken out loud without addressing another. And I had plenty of them while writing the concept for Soil Conversations. There is a beautiful moment when thoughts become animated, livened by one's own breath and voice. Suddenly they feel like a resonating body that responds back to you even though they consist of the same words the initial thought was made of. This in-betweeness, of off becoming that might be thought of as the interstitial - the small spaces in between things as it is described. It is easily overlooked or dismissed yet holds so much potential in its connectedness. Thus the interstitial became the curatorial method for Soil Conversations as a whole. I reflect on the things that grew from it. What informed Soil Conversations, was literally, a conversation about the reality of living in Johannesburg, which through collaborations and partnerships grew into an exchange between Johannesburg and Berlin. Less as geographic paradigms but understood as spaces that hold artistic conversations, that are informed by their own moving and morphing realities and somehow manifested within art practices, materials, and ideas. The intention was to create a project that extends itself and renders its concept within visual art, performances, talks, and writings. Anchored by the partner institutions: Johannesburg Art Gallery and Galerie im Koernerpark (Berlin) , which brought a specific spatiality to the exhibition, influencing the conversations, and the engagement between audience and artworks. The exhibition opening on 26th of May in Berlin and on 26th of August 2023 in Joburg marked the beginnings of a six-month engagement with and through Soil Conversations, including the works of nine artists/duos, eight writers, four performers and a cross-disciplinary engagement through talks and walkabouts. Now, at the time of writing, the closing of the exhibition is one month away, and I am wondering what my relationship to it is now. Like a ball of clay, it has been changed by so many moments, impacted by others, shifted through unexpected turns and altered its consistency throughout.
In an almost-retrospect I see myself confronted by an interesting dilemma, the classic cartographer’s dilemma - translating the elliptical mass onto a flat surface. How to look at a multilayered project like Soil Conversations with all its connotations, issues, ideas of Soil, land, history, identity, female divinity, the psychology of space, the speculative and so on … ? The project's attempt was never to comprehend any of the aforementioned vast concepts, it was the idea to prompt and to nurture exchanges and ideas, yet a longing for closure persists - of a project, budget, chapter? In this contemplation, what keeps coming up with excitement are the many causal sequences, the moments something split into a multitude and grew beyond the initial idea, that I am most thankful for.
All these numerous walkabouts, conversations, talks and especially the extended Soil Conversations that the writers have created are a testament to the interstitial concept. The brief to the writers was to use Soil Conversation as an archive and departure point, similar to the idea of soil as a bearer and holder of an archive made of parts and particles. The exhibition was there to start a thought that can be carried in every possible direction and thus permeates something that grew out of a particular yet offers something that is relevant to a beyond. The concept and artworks became the fertile ground for this engagement. I am hugely grateful for the community that held Soil Conversations and the collaboration between friends, colleagues and institutions that all agreed on being part of this project.
Nisha Merit is an independent curator, writer, and researcher between Johannesburg and Berlin. Her collaborative work as a curator is based on Process as Practice and offers an extension to the institutional system, defined in para- an entity that is neither against the institution nor fully defined by it. Applying this methodology Merit works transdisciplinary with practitioners, spaces, and practices. Process Practices is a method of attentiveness and deep care for the subject matter and its products. Being an active part of a process and exchange between people and objects. The acknowledgment of the multitude of realities that exist in the diversity of lives. The openness to learning new or different ways of working, thinking, and articulating projects and subject matters, creates interstitial spaces for knowledges and processes to be articulated and shared.
Soil Conversations - Introduction
Yolanda Kaddu-Mulindwa
The project "Soil Conversations" has already accompanied me since January 2022 - for me personally it represents a journey towards my own history, identity, past and future as a Black German.
Together with curator Nisha Merit we have realised two iterations - at Galerie im Körnerpark in Berlin (27.05.-30.08.2023) and at Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG) in Johannesburg (27.08.-18.11.2023). Specifically, what is this exhibition about and what are we showing?
It is about what we stand and walk on and it is an elementary part of our lives: soil. Food grows from it and we build our houses on it - it is therefore one of the foundations of our lives. With the selected artistic positions, we let countries and continents, cultures, history, present and future enter into dialogue. This dialogue began in May 2023 at the Galerie im Körnerpark and continued in August 2023 at the Johannesburg Art Gallery. The text contributions by authors from Germany and South Africa were not only artist's or artistic work texts, but also contributed to a larger and complex theoreme and context and conveyed different perspectives. Especially in Mahret Ifeoma Kupka and Magnus Elias Rosengarten’s texts, the question of one's own identity as a Black German becomes center stage and with it associated experiences of growing up between two worlds and questions of hegemony. Observations following are examinations of the element earth as an archive of memories and the understanding that soil is alive and thus marked like a body by traces of history and past experiences as well as the soil’S ability to transform and regenerate itself.
The works presented encourage us to rethink our relationship with soil and reflect on how easy and humble our relationship with earth once was and how we have distanced ourselves from it over the years. Education about our ecosystem takes place at a young age and should, of course, always be put to the test. Even though the earth can regenerate itself with its transformative and life-giving power, it still needs our cooperation in order to be protected from destruction, a destruction that would ultimately also destroy us along the way. We need to find new ways to have a future worth living.
Soil Conversations creates intercontinental connections, because one unifying element of humanity is the earth we live on. A discourse between the analogue and the digital world has been developed as part of the project, enabling a thematic discussion and continuation of the dialogue between people from different backgrounds on all continents via the website www.soilconversations.com. It invites us to question our own relationship to the environment we live in. Involving the public is important to us, so we have created an extensive accompanying programme with performances, workshops and talks to allow heterogeneous voices to be heard and experienced. As the source of life, soil is important for everyone and cannot be ignored. We should therefore take care of it intently, just as Mother Earth takes care of us.
Yolanda Kaddu-Mulindwa is the director of the municipal galleries Neukölln, the Department of Visual Arts and Art in Urban Space of the district of Neukölln. She studied art and cultural history at the University of Augsburg and completed her master's degree in art and visual history at Humboldt University in Berlin. She was a curatorial assistant for the Festival of Future Nows 2014 at Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin and in 2017 at Hamburger Bahnhof - Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart and worked for Light Art Space (LAS) in 2018. From 2017 to 2019 she worked for the art book publisher Frölich & Kaufmann. As a freelance curator, in 2021 she conceived and organised two art festivals as part of the DRAUSSENSTADT initiative.
ARTISTS & ART INDEX
LUNGISWA GQUNTA
MADEYOULOOK
IO MAKANDAL
SILVIA NORONHA
NNENNA ONUOHA
THERESA SCHUBERT
GEMMA SHEPHERD &
ROCHELLE NEMBHARD
MIA THOM
NATALIE PANENG
PERFORMING ARTISTS & INDEX
HELENA UAMBEMBE
ELA SPALDING
BILLY LANGA
TALKS
(in Berlin)
BONAVENTURE SOH BEJENG NDIKUNG
YOLANDA KADDU-MULINDWA
NISHA MERIT
(in Johannesburg)