Online public lecture as part of the lecture series Conceiving the Ethico-Political Power of Africa’s Contemporary Art(ivism).

This lecture will take place from 14:00 to 15:30 on Teams (click here for the Teams link; Meeting ID: 329 306 710 29; Passcode: W2QQXW)

In this lecture, Professor Makhubu reflects on the photography exhibition The Evaton Peoples’ Archive (2022) as a way to address class politics and civic engagement through the arts. Designed to catalyse intergenerational dialogue among residents, the aforementioned exhibition sought to uncover the suppressed histories of Evaton (an area that lies south of Johannesburg) once defined by its flourishing Black transnational and pan-African institutions and the locus for key intellectuals in the liberation movement and protests in South Africa. Currently, Evaton is mired in land disputes and state neglect. Images of cosmopolitan educated landowners in Evaton show inter-class dynamics and how, through photography, class consciousness shaped local and transnational solidarities, and what the lessons might be for the decolonial perspective.

Nomusa Makhubu is an Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Cape Town. Her many articles and chapters focus on African popular culture, photography, interventionism, live art, and socially engaged art. Makhubu also does curatorial work such as the international exhibition Fantastic in Michaelis Galleries in 2015, co-curated with Nkule Mabaso.