Sasol New Signatures Catalogue 2021 - Book - Page 92
CURATOR'S NOTES
CURATOR'S
NOTES
90
We sincerely hope that
everyone who views the
exhibition will appreciate
the thinking, planning
and curation that go into
a complex exhibition
such as this.
The Pretoria Art Museum’s curatorial team has been responsible
for curating the Sasol New Signatures exhibition for a number
of years. The challenge each year is always the same, how do we
curate a cohesive exhibition of around 100 completely unique and
disparate artworks from all corners of the country? The process
of placing artworks always begins naturally, with some artworks
creating instant visual conversations and complimenting each
other thematically. But then there are those artworks which
are extremely strong as autonomous visual texts, making them
difficult to marry with the rest of the exhibition. The considered
use of the museum’s space enables the curators to create
the necessary connection between artworks in order for the
exhibition to flow and engage audiences.
Throughout the years, the Sasol New Signatures curatorial team
has seen creative and thematic trends come and go. There are of
course a few artistic narratives that recur such as those dealing
with socio economic factors, the political climate of the time, and
the human condition. This year we saw a newly added theme,
namely, the world-wide Covid-19 pandemic, and the focus on
Covid that came through in the majority of artworks has resulted
in an exhibition that speaks to the spirit of our times. Yet besides
this fixation with Covid and its aftermath, the entrants for the
2021 Sasol New Signatures competition delivered some quality
artworks that made curating this year’s exhibition a joy.
Curatorial team
SASOL NEW SIGNATURES • 2021 CATALOGUE
