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2016: Selfportrait as an ass

SelfPortraitAsAnAss4a.jpg

‘Selfportrait as an ass’. 2016. Johan Thom. Found objects (donkey’s head in Material One courtesy Dsw Dionysus Sculpture Works ; Concise Oxford dictionaries, signed by my maternal grandfather J.F. Besselaar 1979; reproduction full-scale human skeleton; casts of my hands and feet in Material One & mixed media).

The artwork is shown here as installed at ‘Foundations and Futures’ – the Bag Factory’s 25th anniversary exhibition held in October 2016.

The work is a wry comment on my history as a modern day Afrikaner and my complex linguistic and cultural heritage.My grandfather was often forced to wear donkey ears at primary school because he ‘spoke Dutch’ (as opposed to English). He hated the English with a passion.

Rather than joining South Africa’s war effort on the side of the Allies during the second world war he chose to hide out in the Orange River Canyon for two years with three other young men of German descent. Put in context, both his parents were placed in internment camps during the First World War in South Africa and their health and welfare suffered greatly – they both contracted tuberculosis in the camps.In 2008 I was awarded a Commonwealth Scholarship to complete my PhD at the Slade School of Art, UCL, London. I ended up spending five years in the UK and the kindness of my English patrons, academic supervisors and friends will never be forgotten.

SelfPortraitAsAnAss3.jpg

During my years as a studio artist at the Bag Factory I rediscovered Afrikaans as a poetic language – largely owing to the insistence of the artist Pat Mautloa (a black South African colleague at the Bag Factory) who regularly forced me to speak Afrikaans to him. Pat loved the language and wanted me to teach him how to speak it well. I had largely given up on the language already at high school, that is, other than it functioning as a home-language. This rejection ironically relegated it back to its marginalised historic status as a ‘kitchen language’ in my life.

In Afrikaans they say ‘Nie eers n ń donkie stamp nie sy kop twee keer teen dieselfde klip nie’ (A donkey does not bump its head on the same rock twice). But I keep bumping my head and now refuse to identify as anything but an ‘Afrikaner’ – it makes things so delightfully difficult for everyone else including my fellow Afrikaners.

History is a winding road.

Selfportrait-as-an-ass-2-2018.jpgAbove: ‘Missing: Selfportrait as an ass asleep in my son’s bed’ (2019). Photographic inkjet print on Hannemeule. 2/3 (Edition of 3 and one artist proof). 50 cm x 65 cm. Photo Credit: Garreth Fradgely

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    • PERFORMANCE
      • 2003: Bind/Ontbind Series
      • 2004-6: Outpost Series
      • 2006: The Theory of Gravity
      • 2008/9: Vox Populis/ Vox Dei
      • 2008: Come in peace/ Go to pieces (2008)
      • 2008: Traffic
      • 2008: Twilight
      • 2010-12: Incantation Series
      • 2010/11: Recital
      • 2010: Biblioclast (Action with Afrikaans/Dutch Dictionary)
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      • 2010: Host 1
      • 2011: Container
      • 2011: Licked Colony
      • 2011: Thank you
      • 2013: For Linnaeus
      • Fountain (Date Withheld)
      • …other performances
    • VIDEO/INSTALLATIONS
      • 2002: The pencil test series
      • 2003: Violence and Happiness
      • 2004: The Labyrinth
      • 2005: The Minotaur Series 12
      • 2006: The Theory of Evolution
      • 2006: The Theory of Flight
      • 2007: Ascension
      • 2007: Birth of a Tyrant (2007)
      • 2007: Terms of endearment
      • 2008: Challenging Mud (After Kazuo Shiraga)
      • 2008: Outpost 4
      • 2008: The Theory of Displacement
      • 2009: Panopticon
      • 2010: blood rites/ eat your words
      • 2010: Host II
      • 2010: Illumination
      • 2010: Shellshock
      • 2011: Flow
      • 2019: Recital: Decoy
    • OBJECTS
      • 2007: Looking for Lucy
      • 2007: Molotovmammas
      • 2007: Philistine rules/ Did you know?
      • 2007: The OK Revolution
      • 2009: Vessel – Perfect Lovers
      • 2010: Gold works
      • 2010: Knobkierie
      • 2010: Recital (Lend me your ears)
      • 2010: Songbirds
      • 2011: Workhorse (with Guy Du Toit)
      • 2012: Fallen – monument for throwing…
      • 2013: The Animal Series
        • …….Collaborative large-scale etchings
        • …….Drawings
        • …….Mahout (video)
        • …….Photographs
        • …….Sculptures with Guy Du Toit
      • 2014-15: Faust the African Series
      • 2016: Promises, promises…
      • 2016: Selfportrait as an ass
      • 2016: Selfportrait with skull
      • 2017: The Hanging Garden
      • 2019: Houseboat
      • 2020: Houseboat #2
    • ABOUT
      • Artist statement
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      • Shortened CV
      • Interviews
        • 2003: Interview with Carine Zaayman
        • 2006: Interview with Willem Boshoff
        • 2007: Interview with David Koloane (2007)
        • 2008: Interview with Peter Machen
        • 2008: Radio Papesse Interview as part of ‘.za: Young Art From South Africa’
        • 2009: Johan Thom interviewed by Sarah Claire Picton
        • 2010: The ghosts wish to remember: Interview with Petra Zemljič
        • 2018: The Aestheticized Interview with Johan Thom (South Africa) – Kisito Assangni for ArtDependence
      • Authored
        • David Koloane (1938–2019) – Artforum International
        • Kendell Geers at the Steven Friedman, London
        • Life intimidating art, The Diplomat, Sept/Oct 2007
        • Roger Ballen at the Johannesburg Art Gallery, 2007
        • The sleeping monster produces reasons : Diane Victor
        • Santu Mofokeng (2010)
        • The sense of fresh air (2010)
        • Taming the Trojan Horse: Disarming the Politics of Otherness in a Postcolonial (African) Context
    • CONTACT
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