AT.joburg01 featured a walkabout and panel discussion on art and technology in South Africa – its current practitioners, influences, and spaces: where will they go from here? It was organized by AT.joburg and the JAG (johannesburg art gallery), and sponsored by the JAG and the American Consulate of South Africa.

There was a a great turnout and a fantastic vibe around the work, what is possible in “the digital revolution” (can you smell the irony?), where it always already had begun, what we place value on, and how to locate various technologies, and the potentials they explore (literally and conceptually), in a Southern African context.

The walkabout, of nathaniel stern’s the storytellers, raised some interesting questions from the participants, who asked about things from the devaluation of time spent on art when using software, to the pretense of narcissism in explorations of “self”, and “the promise of something new” inside and outside of interactive spaces. It set the stage for our panel discussion, bravely led by journalist Sean O’Toole, current editor of Art South Africa.

Above, left is video artist Thando Mama, next choreographer/journalist Zingi Mkefa making a point about where and how bodies can be further implicated, even explicated, in the new generation of interactive arts – if only it only weren’t so “wink, wink, nudge, nudge”. On the right is a full view of our panelists, from far left: Sean O’Toole, Thando Mama, Zingi Mkefa, media artist Franci Cronje, artist/curator/innovator Marcus Neustetter (of The Trinity Session, digi-arts Africa and the Southern African New Media Art Network), artist/lecturer Marc Edwards, video artist Churchill Madikida and Prof. Christo Doherty, Head of Digital Arts at Wits School Of the Arts.

We started at noon, and went straight on until five – what a great start of dialogue! More plans for future AT.joburg events are in the works….

The first, advertised AT.joburg event (a collaboration with the johannesburg art gallery, and sponsored by the american consulate) is the mail & guardian pick of the week!

Here’s the text, for future reference (the catered event starts at noon, and carries on into the afternoon):

Art pick of the week

Public Walkabout and Digital Media Art Seminar Discussion Johannesburg Art Gallery: December 4

The critical positioning of “new media” art, which includes video, digital and net.art, and even installation, within the broader economies of fine and contemporary art, is something that is contended and debated the world over, but more particularly in “developing” countries, where the digital divide is most fundamentally obvious.

In South Africa in particular, access to technology, illiteracy and the legacy of apartheid education systems, and even access to electricity itself are conditions we live with side by side with wireless communication and other state of the art technologies. There is currently a push for scholars to take an interest in science and technology but how does this figure in terms of technology’s relationship to culture?

As part of an education programme supporting Nathaniel Stern’s current exhibition The Storytellers: Works From the Non-aggressive Narrative, there will a be free, public walkabout of this richly layered and critically informed show at noon on December 4. This is followed by a seminar discussion moderated by writer and editor of Art South Africa Sean O’Toole, and featuring practitioners, curators and artists who work within the field.

The kinds of topics under discussion will include defining the various practices in new media versus digital media, questioning digital media’s role in relation to traditional media like painting, looking at the developmental and educational potential of digital media, and issues concerning the collecting and curating of these “new” art forms. Anyone with an informal or professional interest in the digital realm, including artists, designers, writers and composers, should make a point of attending.

— Kathryn Smith