[…] Special Issue: Johannesburg Lasts
Issue Editorial
Editorial: Last, Lasting, Lost
The specter stands for that which never simply is and thus escapes the totalizing logic of conventional cognitive and hermeneutic operations. It cannot be reduced to a straightforward genesis, chronology or finitude and insists on blurring multiple borders, between visibility and invisibility, past and present, materiality and immateriality, science and pseudo-science, religion and superstition, life and death, presence and absence, reality and imagination
(Esther Peeren, 10).
What are Johannesburg’s spectres and whom do they haunt? What spectres of late capitalism inhabit a city hastily erected on top of the rich seam of gold that lay beneath? How do legacies from Johannesburg’s past mingle with its future
Johannesburg Lasts is a research collection that seeks to uncover, unpack and deepen investigations into spectres of Johannesburg, it’s toxic legacies, its facades and the residues of its disturbed surfaces. Our initial impetus was sparked by the last remnants of an archive: The 1976 book Johannesburg Firsts by librarian Anna Smith. Johannesburg is a city young enough for Smith to keep a biased score of its firsts. She presents a vast amount of information, from the city’s large industrial debuts all the way down to the first chicken hatched in Johannesburg. This story not only loses key details and facts in Smith’s retelling, but is charged with the racist assumptions of that era in apartheid South Africa. It left us wondering about what it would mean to consider Johannesburg in terms of its lasts.
Through the framing of the last and the lost, we ask questions of how to imagine a city in terms of its ends, its spectres – those which are “both revenant, that which returns from the past, and arrivant, that which is to come…” and its continued and future hauntings (Peeren 2014: 14). Here we think of the remnants of apartheid spatial planning, the facades of Johannesburg’s suburbs and enclaves, and the “emergence of diverse urban worlds within the same territory—strange mappings and blank figures, discontinuous fixtures and flows, and odd juxtapositions” (Mbembe 2004: 375).
Johannesburg is an exquisite corpse, collaged from other times and other places, “characterized by an unmediated adjacency” a “hybrid composition” that “betrays an attempt at synthesis” (Comaroff and Ong 2013: 85). It is a city that operates through forms of mimicry and mimesis “evident in the city’s contemporary architectural forms […] in its mania for wealth, for the sensational and the ephemeral, for appearances” (Mbembe 2004: 376).
We ask questions of appearance, surfaces and residues, the visible and invisible, the sonic, tactile, emotional and radioactive. We ask questions of what lives above the surface, what legacies can be resurfaced and revisited, and what logics govern the cities operations – it’s roads, it’s policies, it’s building codes, it’s highways, and the rivers of mine dust floating off the top of dunes scattered around the edges of the city, settling in to the fine tissue of our lungs. What reenactments of dark colonial and patriarchal legacies continue to govern our present interactions with and future imaginings of this city?
In a city weighed down by extreme inequality and infrastructural breakdown (Myambo 2019: 2), during a time of cataclysmic global environmental and health crises, how do we catalogue, capture and research a city’s lasts?
Johannesburg’s construction and collapse occurs simultaneously alongside projects of regeneration and renewal. In many spaces, the remains of old buildings stand beside temporary structures, “this psychic life inseparable from the metropolitan form: its design, its architectural topographies, its public graphics and surfaces” (Mbembe 2004: 375). Johannesburg’s old and new CBDs (developed in the 1930s and 1970s, respectively) attest to a crass modernist urge to expand new ground rather than adjust to the shifting stakes of city space.
Land-locked and without obvious natural resources to draw people to it, Johannesburg has relied on extraction, artifice and novelty. From its very beginnings, “Johannesburg was fashioned as the ultimate city of the nouveau riche capital, luminous and exciting, yet superficial and unforgiving … with no historically consistent aesthetic sensibility or genuine commitment to the cultural heritage of the past (Murray 2011: 9). Johannesburg is now an amalgamation of densely layered and built upon historical space, loosely attached to swathes of urban sprawl. It could even be described as a city that has nostalgia for the future rather than the past (Malcomess and Kreutzfeldt 2013: 18).
A central question that haunts this landscape is one of boundaries. What are this city’s physical boundaries and where are its edges? Ever more ingenuous security fences, wires and walls clearly outline who feels they have something that needs protecting and who does not. What of the rewritten CBD, the emergence of satellite financial districts in the north, like Sandton, and the superficial smart enclaves like that of the unrealised Modderfontein fantasy? What of the hollow ground underneath and the dusty atmosphere of constant construction and ruination above? Perhaps the most pertinent question this special edition of Ellipses asks is: In an “elusive” city that refuses definition, what can be pinned down as being specifically of this place, belonging enough to last? (Nuttall and Mbembe 2004).
The specters of Johannesburg are territorial: sticky and stubborn. In this special edition and with contributions that blur the lines of disciplinary practice; realised through code, static and moving images, 3D models, digital maps and interactive interfaces. All made with the intention of being accessed through screens and through them, we hope to engage with the specters that continuously create new bridges between past, present and future.
Territorial edges, dusty surfaces and sticky histories:
This city, like so many others, is threaded with encounters of lasts and losts. It is scattered with attempts to ensure its history remains, spread out across blue plaques and monuments. In the following collection of projects we see the messiness of official and unofficial histories play out. As the different projects take us along streets, under the earth, into forgotten places and future musings, there is a restlessness across them all. An undertone that says perhaps something refuses to be settled. This speaks to the haphazard assemblage of moving parts that make up Johannesburg. The projects here all, in different ways, pay close attention to the movement of people, plants, dust, data and the very visible and invisible workforces that make the city work. Overall, there is a sense of agitation and unease throughout.
Projects like those of Counterspace, Dorothee Kreutzfeldt and Brett Pyper are tied to the legacies of specific sites in the old CBD. We are drawn into potential versions and visions of Kwa Mai Mai market, a burnt and later demolished demolished building, and an historic cultural Jazz landmark. Where Pyper’s former Bantu Men’s Social Club is now an echoing heritage site, Kreutzfeldt reflects on the end days of The Bank of Lisbon through an unsettling video and sound piece. In close proximity to these sites geographically, Counterspace delves into the psychic and radioactive vibrations of a possible future Kwa Mai Mai market, where the toxic legacies of the mining industry mingle with the business savvy of Johannesburg’s vibrant informal market. Each of these projects render the aesthetics of the surface as hypnotic, and reach into the underworld of voices and messages: from the past or the future we don’t fully know.
Nkgopoleng Moloi draws us away from such histories and futures, with multiple (often conflicting) narratives, to pull us into her own vulnerable personal position walking the Braamfontein streets as a black womxn. These social and political architectures are all evocatively conjured with sound and movement.
Throughout this special edition, the senses are important. Nina Barnett and Jeremy Bolen make us aware of our skin and the surfaces of our devices, through a meditation on the ubiquitous dust that is, perhaps, the one intimate element that all inhabitants of Johannesburg must live with. In opening up the world of stones beneath the built and building city, Brigitta Stone-Johnson expands on the make-up of not only dust, but the deep time of continental shifts beneath the Braamfontein Ridge.
Riley Grant and William Shoki take disembodied experience into the realm of Marx and Zoom, questioning the always-on workforces of late capitalism. They pull into focus the labour practices behind the shiny surfaces and projections of Sandton, its digital interfaces and its hypnotising blurring of life and work. Lastly, the interruptions of DigiCleanse’s advertisements highlight the ubiquitousness of capitalism operating through the wellness industry, preying on the citizens of polluted and toxic cities who seek refuge in new age cleansing tools, both for mind and body.
Dusty Futures:
The events of the past year have shifted how we think about traces, effects, marks, and remains. On both a micro and macro scale, from the surface of our lungs and groceries to our travel routes and movements, Johannesburg life has changed. Through the sightings and soundings of aspects of the city presented here we hope to draw attention to the screens which display, frame, code, render and augment our interaction with the idea of the city and its people and their uncovering through this creative research.
Bibliography:
Comaroff, J. and Ong, K-S, 2013. Horror in Architecture. California: Novato
Malcomess, B. and Kreutzveldt, D. 2013. Not No Place: Johannesburg. Fragments of Spaces and Times. Johannesburg: Fanele.
Mbembe, A. 2004. “Aesthetics of Superfluity” in Public Culture 16(3). Duke University Press, pp 373–405
Murray, M. 2011. City of Extremes: The Spatial Politics of Johannesburg, Durham and London: Duke University Press.
Myambo, M. 2019. “Introduction: Jo’burg’s spatial dilemmas resonate globally” in Myambo, M. (ed), Reversing Urban Inequality in Johannesburg, London and New York: Routledge, pp 1-9.
Nuttall, S. and Mbembe. A. 2004. ‘Introduction: Afropolis’ in Nuttall, S. and Mbembe, A. (eds). Johannesburg: The Elusive Metropolis. Durham and London: Duke University Press. pp 1-36.
Peeren, E. 2014. The Spectral Metaphor : Living Ghosts and the Agency of Invisibility. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Smith, A. 1976. Johannesburg Firsts / Johannesburgse Eerstes, Johannesburg: Africana Museum.
Articles by
Brett Pyper
Articles by
Brigitta Stone-Johnson
Articles by
Dorothee Kreutzfeldt
Articles by
Jeremy Bolen
Articles by
Karin Tan
Articles by
Nina Barnett
Articles by
Nkgopoleng Moloi
Articles by
Riley Grant
Articles by
Sarah de Villiers
Articles by
Skye Quadling
Articles by
Sumayya Vally
Articles by
William Shoki
About
Andrea Hayes
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Brigitta Stone-Johnson
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Glen Mudau
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Laura Seal
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Paul Sika
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Andrei van Wyk
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Jarrett Erasmus
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Karin Tan
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Naadira Patel
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Ruth Sacks
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Skye Quadling
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Tara Weber
Narratives Of Mobility
The trategies of survival to allow womxn to navigate the inner city.
"Patriarchy, misogyny and their legacy have resulted in a pervasive culture that makes womxn feel unsafe in central Johannesburg."
Abstract
Patriarchy, misogyny and their legacy have resulted in a pervasive culture that makes womxn feel unsafe in central Johannesburg. Womxn have had to find strategies of survival to allow them to navigate. These strategies entail personal mappings of routes and lines that allow womxn to move through the city. I will examine my journey of walking from the Gautrain Park Station to the Wits Art Museum, via Jorissen Street, using my experiences as a method to generate insight and knowledge. My research is underpinned by the idea of “theorising from the epicentres of our own agency”. I think through how womxn can use their personal, embodied experiences as a valid starting point from which knowledge can be produced. The title of this project contains two words that can function within a particular framework/reading. The first is “narrative” and the second is ‘navigate’. ‘Narrative’ is a retelling of an account of specific events that has taken place. Narrative becomes a method to capture experiences where each step functions as a proxy for memory. By presenting this project as a narrative, I make personal observations based on my own perceptions. I am aware that my experiences will be influenced by race and class as well as how my body is read by others. The word “navigate” draws attention to the inherent difficulty experienced in attempting to move from one place to the next as a Black womxn … and doing so safely. I am concerned with the idea of safety, or rather, perceptions of safety. For me, safety means the ability to complete the journey without incident. An incident can either be a verbal provocation (including but not limited to catcalling) and in extreme cases, may include a physical provocation such as mugging, (wo)manhandling and/or rape.
Authors
Nkgopoleng Moloi
Digital Editor
Glen Mudau
Peer Reviews
Peer Review
General Note:
[…] Ellipses Journal for Creative Research endeavours to make bare the process of research and development in creative and artistic research. This is for readers / viewers an opportunity and mechanism to see the types of academic critique engaged with creative research and to make visible the responses and development.
The following peer review was produced blind and in process, the artist / author has subsequently been given the opportunity to respond and develop both the theoretical and interactive parts of the article before publication. What you see published has been edited post this review.
Peer Review 1: Narratives of Mobility (2020)
Reviewer: Anonymous
Which aspects of the submission are of interest / relevance and why?
This is a great project as it really fits the theme of the current issues and relates an experience of the city and maps through various interactive point a journey from point A to B we’ve all done as pedestrians in the city.
The project offers an interesting reflection on what it means to be a womxn in Joburg, and the measures we all take to guarantee our safety. It reflects Johannesburg daily life and brings forward larger issues related to patriarchy and violence in the society through the map of a short journey.‘
How are the artistic and research outcomes represented?
The use of mix media media: audio, animation and text does service to the project and its discourse. The submission has an adequate description and explains clearly its intent. The use of various points on map with each its explainer supports the overall effectiveness of the message and makes the viewer / listener curious about the city and the points mapped by the artist.
How well does the design support the submission?
The design is overall aesthetically pleasing and works to convey the intention of its creator. I however would have like to see the medium pushed a bit further: while the objectives is to related the author’s experience of the city, I think it would have been interesting to include background noises of the streets: kids chatter, horns, etc... I also would have like to see more of a visual variety, like multiple animations speaking to each point of the map. There is currently only one animation to take you through the journey.
Are there any ethical or legal concerns?
None
Conclusions and and pre publication revision:
I think the submission could go as it is presented at the moment. I however would recommend improvement to the design as listed in point 4.This piece in my opinion fits with the theme of Joburg Last and brings important reflections about the status of womxn in the city.
Peer Review
General Note:
[…] Ellipses Journal for Creative Research endeavours to make bare the process of research and development in creative and artistic research. This is for readers / viewers an opportunity and mechanism to see the types of academic critique engaged with creative research and to make visible the responses and development.
The following peer review was produced blind and in process, the artist / author has subsequently been given the opportunity to respond and develop both the theoretical and interactive parts of the article before publication. What you see published has been edited post this review.
Peer Review 2: Narratives of Mobility (2020)
Reviewer: Anonymous
Which aspects of the submission are of interest / relevance and why?
What I found most interesting about this submission was the multiple ways it engaged with the notion of agency.
The first instance was overt:in the use of ‘womxn’ and the deliberate elaboration on why this was done. To extend the experience of women to all who identify as such is an essential gesture, particularly when considering the work takes the form of map laden with many of tropes found in a public service announcement. It is an extension of the understanding that the public domain in the city of Johannesburg can be considered hostile to all who identify as women, and this consideration is derived from similar or shared experiences. It casts the net wide, and provides a successful social and political contextualization of the personal observations that follow.
The second was in the presentation of two possible routes from Park Station to WAM. The presentation of two separate routes is not overt, but it becomes evident through the illustration used that there are two pathways, each with landmarks that are evaluated according to their potential to offer safety. The preparation of two routes means implicitly that there will always be a second option should a chosen direction prove unsafe –perhaps in the event of a strike (asis suggested for COSATU House). What is interesting to me is the tension between vulnerability and agency. The author is extremely successful at portraying the street, or the public domain between Park Station and Jorissen Street as completely out of her control, where at any moment circumstances could change. Through her descriptions of certain spaces, we begin to get a sense of the vulnerability of her body where she does not feel 100 percent certain of her ability to predict what might happen next. Her use of an audio recording to convey this, adds to the physicality or tangibility of her lived experience. That her experiences and consequent findings are real, and perhaps also the result of the necessity within her own daily life only become clear later on –at the hair salon and at the conclusion. While at first my initial reaction was a wish to have learned of this earlier, instead of feeling as though I am learning of an experiment done for its own sake, I now feel that leaving this aspect to be discovered adds a layer of meaning perhaps best felt in contrast to the clinical language used throughout.
How are the artistic and research outcomes represented?
As mentioned earlier, it only became clear to me much later in engaging with this work, that almost all of the content or findings it contained were as a result of a daily lived experience,that takes place outside of the academic context. The first time this happened was at the moment the author relayed an anecdote about getting hair extensions at the salon that also features as a place of safety on one of the routes. Up until that point, as a reader and viewer, I was kept within the interpretation that this map was created as part of a theoretical unpacking around the experience of walking in the city as a black woman. The author even goes as far as to verbally quote authors and years published in her opening text, as if to reinforce the sense of distance between researcher and subject. Choosing to frame the question, as well as the notion of agency within a theoretical framework complete with references; has very cleverly set up the start of a narrative where the reader is quickly drawn into series of observations that are immediately related back to the framework provided.
The narrator’s tone of voice does not deviate from a monotone, devoid of emotion, and the listener therefore immediately associates the narrator with the role of researcher and observer. But, as the journey progresses, the audience is allowed clues to something outside of theory, and without distance. Changes in the author’s tone as she relays a particular sentence begin to betray her emotions, however subtly. One such instance is when the author describes how children offer safety not as a result of their individual strength, but rather because “they travel in packs”, the listener can almost hear her smiling as she speaks. These moments give way to a more personal experience, one that is not simply an exercise created for the purpose of knowledge creation, but knowledge gained through the crafting and exercising of personal agency in volatile space. By the time the journey ends with at the arrival of the academy; where the author can finally relax, and where things become predictable again the relief in the author’s voice is palpable. It is within this space, traditionally, that the theorizing and reflection is to begin, and in some way I am left with the feeling that the narrative in fact ends where it began.
The opening text concludes with a reference to the 2019 African Feminisims Conference and “the principle of theorizing from personal agency”, and in light of this, I think the work is successful in doing this.
How well does the design support the submission?
The design of the work is clear in portraying a journey that has a beginning and an end. This is very important given that the author frames the work as a narrative, and the design therefore supports perfectly in form the work’s conceptual proposition. I think the strength of the work lies in the fact that is conveyed through audio, but I also value very much the fact that the text is also provided in that in ensures complete access to the work. The placement of the text at each ‘stop’ on the journey also does not obstruct the work in any way and in fact supports the structure of a map. The elements to the right of the map (‘tactics’, ‘allies’, ‘points of safety’, ‘strategy’) lay clearly the approach taken by the author at each point in the journey. On the whole, the design of the work is extremely clear and builds toward a strong argument throughout the narrative.
Are there any ethical or legal concerns?
The one concern I have is the crossing out of ‘if’ and replacement with ‘when’, in the strategy outline to the right of the map. This part of the work takes on very strongly the aesthetic of public service type communication, and the replacement of ‘if’ with ‘when’ in reference to acts of violence being perpetrated against women seems to play precisely into the tendency of “pathologizing” the city that the author warns about in the opening text. While the work does center on the acknowledged vulnerability of women’s bodies within these spaces, there is an uncomfortability I have in calling events of violence into being before they have taken place.
Conclusions and and pre publication revision:
I think that this work presents an extremely strong argument that in peeling back its layers, presents a cyclical interpretation on how academic knowledge is created. Theorising cannot happen firstly without the physical body being safe from harm, and secondly without material with which to do so. The daily journey from the train station to the university encapsulates this perfectly, and also fits perfectly into the author’s wish to theorise from “personal agency”. This is a work that draws its audience into wanting to experience it again and again; now having realized the deliberate way in which it has been crafted, hoping to find the contradictions that draw on the tension between theory and reality.
The only concern I have is with the public service ‘advice’ to the right of the map. While this does strengthen the frame that the author provides for her audience, the use of ‘when’ instead of ‘if’ feels like an aesthetic gesture that could be misinterpreted as a flippant calling of violence into reality. I know from the meticulous way in which this work has been put together that this is likely not the intention, and so I would caution against the use of this for the sake of aesthetics and without further contextualization as to why this would be justified.
Article
Credits
Facilitated by Karin Tan and illustrations by Brigitta Stone-Johnson