Browsing by Author "Searle, Berni"

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    Imfihlo
    (2016) Siwani, Buhlebezwe; Makhubu, Nomusa; Searle, Berni
    The discourses of ritual, culture and ethics has, over the years, been a primarily ethnographic, philosophical and dramaturgical concern. Secrecy seems central in setting boundaries. Using ritual and culture as the common thread, I question the boundaries that are transgressed by contemporary South African artists in 'showing' and 'telling' things that are otherwise considered as secret. I discuss the ways in which my own practice as an artist and isangoma troubles the threshold. Considering the ideological function of the secret, my work examines the power relations implied in both keeping and divulging 'secrets'. This research poses the question: how does the performance or re-enactment of the secret elements of cultural and traditional practice in live, performance and installation art complicate cultural ethics? Through a discussion of my work, Imfihlo, as well as works by artists such as Nicholas Hlobo, Pieter Hugo, Churchill Madikida, Nelisiwe Xaba and Mocke J van Veuren, I relate the role of secrecy in ideological structures with the trace. This concept exists throughout my research, whether it be in: forgotten histories; rituals and people (what the artist leaves behind); tracing space, or; by exploring the trace as an existential body, a trace of someone who once was, who exists in another realm, and many traces in one body.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Open Access
    Plan B, a gathering of strangers (or) this is not working.
    (2018) Hutton, Dean; Searle, Berni; Lambrecht, Andrew
    The text and images that follow queers2 a dissertation submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of the award of a degree of Master of Fine Art at Michaelis School of Fine Art, as a cohort of the Institute of Creative Arts. The student explores methodologies of Self-Writing, Performance (studies) as Research; Technology as self-reflection and Radical Sharing; considers the Phenomenologies of Whiteness, embodied power and performing the transgressive white body to contribute to understandings of how the white body performs visuality, hypervisibility, reproduction3, considers its relationship to surveillance and embraces becoming monster. The design of this dissertation is an engagement with the current expectations of an object of academic enquiry – the publication bridges disciplines of Fine Art, Media and Performance studies. Treat this as a notebook, a work-in-progress, in transition – an object of research. Add your own notes, doodles and comments. Share it.