One night mid 2005 I crawled over the Nelson Mandela Bridge into the heart of the city of Johannesburg for a durational performance. I was accompanied by the artist Christian Nerf who hosted me for a 24 hour residency at the now defunct City and Suburban Studios.

Barefoot and wearing only old jeans, I also covered myself with an cheap blanket that had been torn apart by dogs. I slowly entered the Johannesburg CBD like so many of the city’s unseen citizens would – with nothing. It was literally freezing (0 degrees centigrade) that night and fearing frostbite I nearly gave up a few times. But by midnight I finally made it to the other side of the bridge. It took over two hours to complete the action.

The work was never exhibited or made public until 23 December 2023. I did so now in honor of the artist Wiliam Pope L. who sadly passed away on this day. This artwork was made in response to his crawling pieces of the 1970’s. Like in many of Pope’s crawling pieces I carried an object in one hand, a video camera in my case. The camera stopped recording after 12min 26sec.

Figure details: Video still: ‘Crawling (The city of gold)’, 2005, Johan Thom.