"Tip toe around Sirius B" by Kemang Wa Lehulere is a drawing featuring a composition of swirling black marks on a white background, creating a sense of movement and rhythm. The abstract forms suggest a dance-like motion, with no recognizable symbols present. The style is minimalist, utilizing bold, calligraphic strokes reminiscent of handwriting. This work reflects Wa Lehulere’s exploration of South Africa’s complex history and its enduring impact, inviting viewers to engage with the interplay between memory and identity in the post-apartheid context. ...
Kemang Wa Lehulere’s practice engages with the past of South Africa, tracing the ways it still haunts the country’s current condition. Working with personal and collective histories and archives, the artist repeatedly employs found objects representing both individual and collective memory. Wooden, old-looking school desks or mass-produced ceramic sculptures of Alsatian dogs are at once familiar and alienating; a reminder from childhood also acting as a reminder of the complexity of social structures within the Apartheid regime of South Africa. Inspired by set design and theatre, Wa Lehulere’s drawings and ‘living sculptures’, comprising smudged chalk drawings on blackboards, sculptures made of grass and soil and wall etchings, further dwell on the processes of revision, juxtaposition and the malfunction of histories. By making history physical and personal, the artist contrasts liberation with repression and sharply connects the painful past with a painful present. ...
