- Title
- Sculpting with fire: celebrating ephemerality at AfrikaBurn 2015 in the Tankwa Karoo, South Africa
- Creator
- Steele, John
- Date Issued
- 2015
- Date
- 2015
- Type
- text
- Type
- Article
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/11260/957
- Identifier
- vital:30075
- Description
- Land art, and some installation art, is usually aimed at relatively temporarily manipulating the surface of the earth. AfrikaBurn takes place annually in the near-desert of the Tankwa Karoo, South Africa. It is a communal event unique to Africa, and manifests as a fleeting week-long series of interventions in the natural environment, partially aimed at creating and then actively destroying free-standing public sculptures, some of which are huge and intricate. AfrikaBurn gives any one of the thousands of participants an opportunity to be inspired on any scale to generate artworks that take into account a principle that no debris whatsoever is left behind on the surface of the earth after a week-long celebration of creative energies. Unlike, for instance, an artwork built on the edge of the Indian Ocean in the Eastern Cape, where rough tidal seas would ensure gradual destruction, at AfrikaBurn, the sacrificial method of choice is controlled rapid burning, under the direction of a specified firemaster. This paper seeks to unbundle some aspects of land and installation art in Southern Africa with specific reference to AfrikaBurn 2015 events and anti-fracking initiatives. This is within a context that takes into account recognition that even seemingly durable public sculptures are subject to change and may even physically disappear with the passing of time.
- Format
- 14 pages
- Format
- Language
- English
- Relation
- South African Journal of Art History
- Relation
- Steele, John. (2015). Sculpting with fire: celebrating ephemerality at AfrikaBurn 2015 in the Tankwa Karoo, South Africa. South African Journal of Art History. 30. 187-200
- Relation
- South African Journal of Art History 30 vol. 3 no. 187 200 2015 0258-3542
- Rights
- Art Historical Work Group of South Africa
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