Transcending

This piece comes as a result of a sitespecific performance/intervention at a loaded and contentious space in Cape Town. District Six, a former innercity residential area in Cape Town, South Africa, has been a desolate space since the events of the forced removals that occurred during the 1970s, under an unjust regime. 

“Colourman,” my avatar, activated the space by constructing a 2.1m x 2.1m wall there; he then plastered it and painted it. “Colourman” - a title for traditional artisans in the history of painting becomes a visual and textual pun, a play on the term “coloured man.”

The performance is done as this person “of colour” clad in paint, figuratively and literally becoming “coloured,” a construction essentially.

The figure enters the frame and starts attacking the wall. Therefore the figure performs the painting process by deconstructing the colour field whilst remaining a painting himself. The gradual demolition of the erected structure makes the background more and more visible. The site becomes evident.

“Colourman” walks out of the frame after tearing the wall down, leaving only the rubble behind before the video fades to black.