By Melanie Nathan, San Francisco, 3-3-10; A South African artist has accused Arts and Culture Minister Lulu Xingwana of being homophobic, after the Minister stormed out in disgust over what she termed a “pornographic” art exhibition featuring black lesbian couples. The Johannesburg exhibition in August last year had aimed to celebrate the role of black South African women.

Xingwana had been due to speak at the opening of the exhibition at Constitution Hill but judged the artwork to be “immoral.” Xingwana had been offended by the work of Zanele Muholi, a critically acclaimed artist whose work explored the identity and relationships of black lesbians in South Africa.

According to Xingwana: “Our mandate is to promote social cohesion and nation-building. I left the exhibition because it expressed the very opposite of this. ”It was immoral, offensive and going against nation-building.”

The exhibition’s curator, Bongi Bengu, told the Cape Times she had been confused by the minister’s actions. Bengu said: “It came as quite a surprise that she was upset; when I conceptualized the exhibition with other artists, it wasn’t our intention to offend.”

This open display of homophobia by a government official is reminiscent of President Zuma’s appointment of the SA Ambassador to Uganda, Minister Qwelane, a known and outspoken homophobe, and one can only wonder if homophobia is systemic in this government where ironically officials takes an oath to uphold a constitution that protects sexual orientation. The artist said she attempted to create a visual history for black South African lesbians, but struggled against homophobia. “I’m really disturbed; it’s censorship.”

Muholi said she feared Xingwana’s remarks would lead to hate crimes against lesbians. “We still have a long way to go, the struggle is not over yet.”
A media release on which the Arts and Culture Department’s seal was printed, stated the exhibition to be “unique, innovative and cutting edge”.

The South African government’s website states that Xingwana served as chairwoman of SADC’s Regional Women’s Caucus. She also chaired the Joint Monitoring Committee for the Improvement of Quality of Life and Status of Women for two years.
According to a News24 source, an Arts and Culture employee has been suspended for allowing the backing of the exhibition. However there are denials that any staff members had been fired as a result of the exhibition, and said the reason had been irregularities in “project funding”. Based on article by By JASON WARNER “Arts minister in lesbian art photo furor March 3, 2010” (Cape Times)

Zanele Muholi won the Casa Africa award for best female photographer and a Fondation Blachère award at Les Rencontres de Bamako biennial of African photography (2009). She also received a Fanny Ann Eddy accolade from IRN-Africa for her outstanding contributions in the study of sexuality in Africa, at the Genders & Sexualities in Africa Conference held in Syracuse, New York. She has work on the group show In Between in conjunction with an artist’s residency at Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania; exhibition dates are 26 January to 16 February. She will also take part in a colloquium on Sara Baartman at the Africana Research Center at Penn State University on 1 March.
BIOGRAPHY
Zanele Muholi was born in Umlazi, Durban, in 1972. She completed an Advanced Photography course at the Market Photo Workshop in Newtown and held her first solo exhibition at the Johannesburg Art Gallery in 2004. She has worked as a community relations officer for the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), a black lesbian organisation based in Gauteng, and as a photographer and reporter for Behind the Mask, an online magazine on lesbian and gay issues in Africa. Her solo exhibition Only half the picture, which showed at Michael Stevenson in March 2006, travelled to the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg and the Afrovibes Festival in Amsterdam. In 2008 she had a solo show at Le Case d’Arte, Milan, and in 2009 she exhibited alongside Lucy Azubuike at the CCA Lagos, Nigeria. Recent group exibitions include Museion Collection: New acquisitions at the Museion – Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Bolzano, Italy (2009); Life Less Ordinary: Performance and display in South African art at Djanogly Gallery, Nottingham, UK (2009); and Undercover: Performing and Transforming Black Female Identities at Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, Atlanta, USA (2009). She was the recipient of the 2005 Tollman Award for the Visual Arts, the first BHP Billiton/Wits University Visual Arts Fellowship in 2006, and was the 2009 Ida Ely Rubin Artist-in-Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Full CV http://zanelemuholi.com -With Thanks to Anne W.

South Africa - When are you going to "put your money where your mouth is?" This is embarrassing., if not at home, then surely on an international level. You have a constitution that is one of the most balanced and profound in the world, yet you fail miserable in its representation. Surely your Ministers ought to uphold the Context. Do you take an Oath and what does that mean. Then to add insult to injury your ARTS minster poops on Art?

You will see in many of my earlier writing, in the USA, I have always mentioned South Africa's progressive and all inclusive Constitution with utmost pride, but now alas I must retract for what is it worth if not honored in practice by those who have sworn to uphold it?


By Melanie Nathan, San Francisco
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Human Rights Advocacy

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