iGoli, Mixed media installation, 2008
All Design Transparent
iGoli – Johannesburg’s nickname, a reference to its former gold deposits, long since depleted and replaced by an unemployment rate of 40%, but still in use in the Zulu tongue and meaning “Place of Gold ” – lends the name and conceptual background to the installation. The media installation iGoli is based on a film that initially leads through the most notorious township on the outskirts of Johannesburg: Soweto. The film is abstracted by repeating the copying process 16,000 times. The motive remains only as an ideal, hidden within the grid, similar perhaps to the concealment of poverty at the city’s outskirts. The stack of flooring grids appears as a three-dimensional visual pendant and also points towards the country’s construction activities.
Text: Ruth Horak,
Excerpt from the exhibition text
1,000 kilograms of flooring grids broach issues of perception and creative use of various materials, both as symbol and conspicuous statement. In a country where millions of people are homeless and without permanent shelter, these grids are a manifestation of the “new gold”.
Material:
150 pcs. flooring grids, wooden pallet, dual video projection 2 x 1.2 m, 4 neon tubes