The 2023 Tomorrows/Today section is titled ‘In and Out of Time’ and represents an homage to the African American poet Maya Angelou’s poem about everlasting love and suffering
The tenth anniversary edition of Investec Cape Town Art Fair
Investec Cape Town Art Fair is a yearly platform, based on a sustainable economic model, that gathers international artists, galleries, curators, museums, art journalists, cultural institutions, collectors and art appreciators in Cape Town to celebrate art. The aim is to establish connections and interactions among the participants, as well as creating a dialogic and educational engagement around contemporary African and global art. The city’s geography represents an integral part of the fair that entices international collectors, facilitates the evolution of the art network and sustains the visibility and exchange of art.
The tenth anniversary edition of Investec Cape Town Art Fair is going to take place from 17 to 19 February 2023 and will focus on ‘the notion of time’ concept. This wide-ranged theme includes ideas related to the past, present and future, as well as the concept of change that comes with the passing of time both for human beings and the world.
Cape Town Art Fair: the sections
The 2023 edition of the art fair will be divided into different areas: the Main section (the core exhibition of contemporary art by galleries from around the globe), Tomorrows/Today (a section that aims to highlight artists who will be tomorrow’s leading names), SOLO (a curated solo presentations section, based on the artistic practices of artists working locally and abroad), the Editions (a section that displays leading print galleries and workshops that specialize in prints, multiples, and editions), Past/Modern (a curated gallery with presentations of Modern artists from 1940 to 2000), ALT (a section dedicated to alternative booth formats and exhibitions that reflect how technological change impacts the art world), Connect (a section showcasing work from cultural institutions that nourish and support artistic production in the region), Special Projects (such as Lalela) and, finally, an area dedicated to art-focused magazines & publications.
Tomorrows/Today
Tomorrows/Today is a section of the fair that, for this new edition, has been co-curated by Natasha Becker and Dr. Mariella Franzoni. This section aims to highlight artists who will be tomorrow’s leading names and acts as a sort of forecast of future relevant practices and ideas. Tomorrows/Today is entirely dedicated to emerging and unrepresented artists, coming both from a South African and global context, that is artists that have been operating and practicing for a few years and yet they haven’t received any significant attention from the institutions, collectors, critics, etc.
An international jury panel of art professionals, led by Tomorrows/Today curators such as Charlotte Ashamu, Bhavisha Panchia, and Josh Ginsburg, will award a cash prize, supported by Fiera Milano Exhibitions Africa, to the artist within the section with the highest quality and most exciting presentation.
In and Out of Time by Maya Angelou
The 2023 Tomorrows/Today section is titled ‘In and Out of Time’ and represents an homage to the African American poet Maya Angelou’s poem about everlasting love and suffering.
«‘In and Out of Time’ is a simple poem, in the sense that is ideally accessible to everybody. It’s a poem about love, seen as a strong energy, a strong feeling that is able to be eternal, to travel across time, to overcome challenges and difficulties that life chose for us. Besides, it’s from Maya Angelou so it’s not only about love but it also has a social political value», explains Dr. Franzoni.
Through this poem, the co-curators Dr. Franzoni and Becker, both close to its author in different ways, elaborated a curatorial framework that would merge together the subjective and intimate understanding of the temporal dimension in relation to the sphere of emotions, the sphere of affections and feelings.
Co-curators Dr Franzoni and Becker on Maya Angelou
Becker adds: «even though our lives are structured according to a rather sequential or chronological perception of time, temporality represents our qualitative or our subjective perception of time. In fact, quality can be experienced in different ways: it can be a moment of action, it can be a slowing down or a speeding up, it can be about successive synchronicities, it can be about when time stops or when we enter a state of timelessness or flow. So, the poem for me weaves in and out, so love and our relationship to love expresses all these dimensions of temporality, the qualities of temporality, how we come in and out of experiences».
This ‘quality of time’ is the concept that is going to be present in every work made by the ten different artists that have been selected to participate in the Tomorrows/Today section: Gino Rubert, Carla Hayes, Talia Ramkilawan, Micha Serraf, Joana Choumali, Cassi Namoda, Deborah Segun, Shamilla Aasha, Githan Coopoo and Rosie Mudge.
In conversation with Dr. Mariella Franzoni
Dr. Mariella Franzoni (Barcelona) and Natasha Becker (New York) are two experienced art curators that come from different paths.
Dr. Franzoni started her career as a curatorial theorist, she explored what curators do in the art world, how they operate, how curatorial narratives are shaped through exhibitions, how they impact artists’ careers and so forth. «All these concepts ended up turning into my PhD research, which I concluded in 2019 and it focused on the intertwining between curatorial practice and thinking with the art market and with the making of both symbolic and economic value in the art world. It was precisely during this research that I started curating as part of curatorial collectives or individually, like independent spaces and in galleries, and more recently my practice has been focusing on art advisory» specifies Dr. Franzoni.
In conversation with Natasha Becker
On the other hand, Becker’s passion for art started while she was studying for her master’s degree to be an historian, at the university of Western Cape, and she became a researcher for an artist for the first time. That set her path to studying for a PhD on art history in the U.S and then, a few years later, she worked with an artist for a curatorial project at an international body art festival in Massachusetts.
«That was really the first time that I took on a curatorial project and that my academic interest and research met with my practical interest in working with artists more closely, that was a real hands-on experience for me. At that point is when I’ve really decided that that was something I wanted to pursue and it was based essentially on wanting to work closely with artists, closer than I was as a researcher or as an art historian for instance and then it was a matter of just doing lots of curatorial work, that’s how I’ve gained my experience» tells Becker.
Dr Franzoni and Becker: Cape Town Art Fair
Both Dr Franzoni and Becker knew Cape Town Art Fair before joining the team, since Dr Franzoni was based in Cape Town from 2014 until 2017, aside from being an active frequenter of the South African art scene, and Natasha grew up in Cape Town and has also worked with several artists in South Africa.
In March, while Dr Franzoni was visiting Miart fair in Milan and was in contact with the team of the fair that she had the opportunity to meet in South Africa, she was invited to co-curate the Tomorrows/Today section and later on she asked Becker to join her. Dr Franzoni explains: «I’ve known Natasha during my time in South Africa. I’ve also spent a few months supporting the curatorial team of Whitman gallery which she was leading as chief curator at that time, so I’ve already seen her at work, curating shows, etc. Being able to co-curate an exhibition with Natasha was a big honor and privilege and that’s how the journey started».
Tomorrows/Today: South African realities
About the making of the project Becker says: «The whole process was smooth, there was no major challenge, Mariella and I were on the same page, the only issues we had were working together with different time zones, to reach out to some artists, located in various places, and to replace some artists after canceling their participation, but everything was organic. I think that the fact that both Mariella and I were familiar with the fair and the city helped us a lot, because of this, we knew what kind of ideas and experiences we wanted to bring and create for local and international visitors, how we wanted Tomorrows/Today to really be a cohesive exhibition distinguishable from every other section, so we put a lot of thought into that».
The selection of the artists for the Tomorrows/Today section has been chosen following two criteria: picking emerging or represented artists with a promising career path (both from spontaneous applications and from artists that were invited to apply) and considering how the artist could respond to the specific curatorial theme.
«We started looking at which artists we wanted on board, not which gallery, it’s a different perspective and mindset. For instance, Natasha introduced one artist, Micha Serraf, and he didn’t have any gallery, but we wanted him to be part of our program, so we started looking for a gallery that could take him to Cape Town and, eventually, he himself found a gallery from New York that is happy to participate at the fair and present his solo show. This example perfectly describes the intention behind Tomorrows/Today that we focus on the artists mostly» explains Dr. Franzoni.
The extra programs at Cape Town Art Fair 2023
Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2023 is going to be one of the biggest editions, being the tenth anniversary of the fair and the most ‘normal’ one post covid pandemic. Therefore, the fair will host a larger number of international visitors and galleries, as well as VIPs, and the fair team is organizing surprises and special gatherings for everyone who is going to be in Cape Town.
Besides, along the main exhibitions of the art fair there will also be a program for extra activities, such as: talk programs (a series of panel discussions by experts on several art-related topics), walkabouts (guided tours to see the fair through the eyes of curators, academics, and artists), gallery night (a tour that provides fairgoers with a full view of Cape Town’s visual art scene, outside of the fair venue), In the booth (a program of book signings, performances and artist meetups in some of the participating gallery booths) and several institutional exhibitions happening around Cape Town at galleries, museums and institutions that are participating in Investec Cape Town Art Fair.
Cape Town, South Africa – not just an art marketplace
Since the beginning, one of Investec Cape Town Art Fair’s main scope focuses, has been to grow both the local and global community through its art scene. What has been supporting the fulfillment of this goal is the ability to put into dialogue artists and galleries from different geographies, different galleries profiles and different artistic practices. Gathering all these people, along with visitors, collectors, journalists, etc. in Cape Town contributes to make the city and the fair a platform for exchange and for building a global community, based in a specific and influential context.
Becker explains: «It’s an ecosystem in which, as a curator, people often ask me why I go to an art fair, since it’s just an art marketplace, buying and selling. That’s how it might look on the outside but from the inside it’s about information sharing, it’s about connecting with colleagues and knowing who has left certain galleries and it’s now working at another gallery, which artists are having major new works coming out, it’s about opportunities of being invited to curate something because you are having a conversation about an artist of interest and it’s also an opportunity to see institutions, to visit museums and to see what exhibitions they are having because often the local museums will have a special program».
Norval Foundation, Zeitz MOCAA, galleries: a sustainable economic model
Furthermore, the fair community wants to prove that art fairs are a sustainable economic model for trade in contemporary art and commits to be sustainable by giving benefits to agents, organizations and institutions present at the fair but also around it, in the city. «All the art world in the city of Cape Town prepares to receive this event but also all the other exhibitions’ activities, lunches, brunches, non- profit organizations, institutions like Norval Foundation, Zeitz MOCAA, galleries, it’s an active and effervescent time. Everybody is there and is ready to welcome newcomers, old friends, it’s an active, healthy and organic time of the year for the Cape Town artists», says Dr. Franzoni.
Investec Cape Town Art Fair is made of a combination between the localism and the internationalism that through the years has transformed a South African city into a global art scene.
Investec Cape Town Art Fair
Convention Square, 1 Lower Long Street, Cape Town, 8001, South Africa. Investec Cape Town Art Fair, produced by Fiera Milano Exhibitions Africa (FMEA), is a platform for collectors, galleries, curators, artists, and art journalists from around the globe to engage and create connections. The art fair will host its tenth anniversary edition, based on ‘the notion of time’ concept, from 17 to 19 February 2023.
