Far and Away: Reporting from the Brink of Change

At the first artistic gathering I attended in Johannesburg in the summer of 1993, the talk was all about Barbara Masekela’s flight from Cape Town to Johannesburg. Masekela is Nelson Mandela’s personal assistant, and one gains access to the great man through her; she is among the most powerful women in the African National Congress (ANC): a bright, tough, accomplished person who stands out in any context for her sheer force of personality. Yet when the flight attendant came through the first-class cabin with the in-flight meal, she served first the white man on Masekela’s right, then the white woman on Masekela’s left, then the people in the row behind. When Masekela complained, the attendant seemed genuinely startled and apologized profusely, explaining that she “just hadn’t seen you sitting there.” She literally hadn’t registered Masekela, as though the upholstery had camouflaged her black face. The white artists with whom I dined argued that while their work couldn’t make white people like black people or vice versa, it needed to address this invisibility.

Two weeks later, I found myself with one of the same artists and some of his friends at a beach near Cape Town. The breeze was hot, the sun was fierce, the sea was icy, and the landscape was stunning. We were lying on the sand when an old colored man (colored was the apartheid catchall for people of mixed race) approached with a crate of ice cream, so heavy he could hardly carry it. He wore a suit with long sleeves and long trousers, and he was sweating profusely in the sun. “God, ice cream,” said one of our group. “Who wants some ice cream?” Of course we all wanted ice cream. “It’s on me,” said someone, and we all chose our flavors, took the ice creams from the man, opened them, and began to eat. “Eight rand,” said the man, and the one who’d volunteered to treat us all checked the pocket of his shirt. “Damn!” he said. “I’ve only got five rand.” No one else had brought any money to the beach. “I’ve got some money in my car,” said one of our company. “If I see you later, I’ll give you the rest.” No one suggested that he go and get the money. No one looked embarrassed. No one apologized. Uncomplaining, the old man picked up his crate and stumbled down the beach in the blazing sun.

The Old South Africa is going strong, even among those who profess to regret it.

But the New South Africa can be equally troubling. I went to the launch of the National Arts Initiative (NAI), which was set to introduce a new era of artistic freedom to the country. Mike van Graan, an ANC member and the general secretary of the NAI, who is colored despite his Afrikaans name, had arranged a program attended by noteworthy artists, writers, and musicians. He suggested that the proceedings take place in English since everyone there spoke English; but several representatives demanded that the proceedings also take place in their native languages. The whites who were on hand sat nervously and submissively through the long monologues in Zulu and Xhosa, with attentive looks fixed politely on their faces. The representatives who had made this demand had understood the speeches when they were first delivered; they chatted merrily throughout the translations, apparently satisfied to have prevailed. As the translations meandered on, some delegates, obviously bored, simply got up and left. The reckless waste of time, money, and energy was stupefying.

Pictures, Concepts, and Beads

The conflicting priorities and mutual insensitivities of the South African art world were being played out in microcosm in the National Gallery of South Africa when I was there. Five years ago, the National Gallery was a dead loss: pictures by Henk Pierneef, the “great” Afrikaner painter, of conquering Boers in lush landscapes hung gloomily beside third-rate works by second-rate American and European artists. Marilyn Martin, the dynamic new director, swept in like the west wind and changed all that. The gallery now houses a permanent collection of work by many of the best artists working in South Africa along with historical material by the liberal white and radical black artists of the past forty years.