KYIV.- The PinchukArtCentre presents the 1st solo exhibition in Eastern Europe by Dineo Seshee Bopape (South Africa), the Main Prize Winner of the 4th edition of the Future Generation Art Prize. The show includes a major soil installation and a series of drawings specially produced for the PinchukArtCentre.
The new monumental earth piece reminds, in form, of ancient spiritual places and draws upon traditional fertility iconography. Ukrainian soil is used in a systematic formal transformation. The earth moves from suggesting human architectural construction into the natural flow of a topographical landscape, evoking the lost presence of water, to finally glide into a quiet bed of soil. On top of that Bopape plays with herbs, crystals, clay, gold-leaf and special collected samples of earth coming from a dozen of spiritual places around the world. The Ukrainian Soil becomes a host for synergies of signs, beliefs, energies and materials for which our language lacks an essential vocabulary.
Soil is solid. It grounds and gives a sense of belonging. It is strongly political. It defines a sense of nationhood and identity. At the same time it remains seemingly still and neutral. However, in the work of Bopape, soil becomes a river. It expands from politics towards spirituality (or from spirituality through politics), reclaiming and re-discovering lost traditions and globally marginalized believe systems.
Bjorn Geldhof, curator of the exhibition and artistic director of the PinchukArtCentre: “We continue a beautiful tradition of presenting the winner of the Future Generation Art Prize with a solo exhibition at the PinchukArtCentre. Dineo Seshee Bopape has expanded the workgroup for which she was awarded the prize in Kyiv in 2017 with a new monumental earthwork. Her use of Ukrainian soil enables the viewers to experience soil in a completely different way. Not only is it a political narrative, but it also manifests as a source of energy and feeling.”
Dineo Seshee Bopape was awarded the Main Prize of the fourth edition of the Future Generation Art Prize for her earth sculpture made of rich black local Ukrainian soil that acts as a platform for objects, organic forms and geological fragments that represent actions and symbols. Her art works were presented as a part of “The Future Generation Art Prize @ Venice 2017” exhibition - an official Collateral Event of the 57th International Art Exhibition – la Biennale di Venezia organised by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation and the PinchukArtCentre.
Dineo Seshee Bopape was born in 1981, on a Sunday. If she were ghanain, her name would be akosua/akos for short. During the same year of her birth, the Brixton riots took place; two people were injured when a bomb exploded in a Durban shopping center; bobby sands dies; 100 were killed during riots in Cassablanca; mtv is launched; the boeing 767 makes its first airflight; umkonto we sizwe performs numerous underground assaults against the apartheid state. princess Di’ of Britain marries charles; bob Marley dies; apartheid SA invades Angola; AIDS is identified/ created/named; salman rushdie releases his book “midnight’s children”; Winnie mandela’s banishment orders are renewed for another 5 years; in the region of her birth- her paternal grandmother dies affected by dementia; people cried and people laughed... The world’s population was at around 4.529 billion... today she(bopape) is 1 amongst 7 billion - occupying multiple intersecting adjectives.
