A search for aesthetics in darkness

A review of "Black at Blank" Art Exhibition by Janet Botes
Exhibition duration: 5 - 28 August 2009
@ Blank Projects, 198 Buitengracht Street, Cape Town

Blank Projects is an artist-run space that encourages experimental, contemporary art that raises questions or generally won't fit within the sphere of profitable or sellable art in the more commercial galleries. This time round, Blank invited seven artists to exhibit one artwork each; and each artwork being reduced in tonality and colour variation to have black as dominating colour.

The exhibition space was painted from floor to ceiling in a dense, solid black that opposes the 'white space' standard that we see in so many of the contemporary art galleries. Artists Zander Blom, Liza Grobler, Nomthunzi Mashalaba, Kathryn Smith, Michael Taylor, Hentie van der Merwe and Mary Wafer contributed towards transforming the black space into a black box with some substance.

Each artwork, in its own way, challenges ideas of the aesthetic in art. Normally gallery viewers would favour artworks with bright or emotive colour; while colour is also one of the main tools that an artist has to express feeling, or other concepts not easily expressed through shape, line or form. The exhibition invitation aptly promises the exhibition to be "the antithesis of the fraudulent sensuality of culture's facade". It also states the exhibition to be "an experiment in voluntary asceticism".

Asceticism can be described as a practice of austere self-discipline, self-denial and self-mortification that could help a person attain a higher or spiritual state of being. Art production - whether it be painting, drawing, sculpture or another form - often encourages self-reflection, a search for truth and a disciplined exploration of ways to communicate ideas, emotion and perceptions about society, life and culture. By restricting colour usage, especially to restrict it to one dominating colour, is a rigorous appeal to self-discipline by the artist.

The focus on black almost creates a somber atmosphere that reverberates deeper into the viewer's mind, creating a 'closeness' and even resulting in mild claustrophobia. This could be imagined and only experienced by some; but at the opening of the exhibition viewers seemed to prefer moving out of the black space to congregate in the corridor. This seemed more as a need to breathe easier, than out of consideration to other people who want to view the artwork in the small space. When standing in the dark black box, viewers almost feel part of the exhibition with the wall and ceiling pressing towards each other to engulf its black walls, the artwork and viewers alike.

The exhibition reminds of Dada in a postmodern world where concept takes preference above execution, unless the execution guides or shapes the concept. In this instance, blackness and the somber are used as conceptual theme that opposes 'prettiness' and luminance.