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| by Gilles Baro |
So Gilles is a friend from the French Alps. We met on Last FM due to knowing some of the same bands. He informed me that he had recently moved to Johannesburg and was doing his PhD, and lecturing, at Wits. He also informed me that he personally knew most of my favourite bands. What was specifically awesome was that he had stayed, and travelled with a lot of the folks involved with plan-it-x records.
After looking at his photography page and quite literally wanting to rip off his skin and be disguised by its epidermis... a realization that the more these images passed through the lenses of my eyes, the more the life affirming adventures demand more from me, the viewer, than vicariously experiencing the beauty captured within the photographs. This was unmistakable. This was very fitting.
Next week Wednesday 27 November he'll be showing the documentary "Invisible Nation: DIY spaces in the USA" which he co-directed in 2008. This is a once off screening as there were complications with the film and this will most probably be the only time anyone will ever see it.
- Shaun (2013/11/22 written at 03:45am)
Event Info:
Two South-African experts on alternative spaces will take part of the discussion.
Feel free to invite friends! Come at 18:30 for drinks (donations-based, very punk) and I'll start talking from 19:00
"Punk house" is a term often associated with dirty, dog-filled, unsafe spaces where many punk artists live to keep the rent low. The pictures try to prove the opposite, that punks and other non-mainstream artists can create colourful, inspiring and well organized spaces. Emerging from these spaces is an intense creative energy and politics related to alternative ways of living, away from the capitalist mainstream. These houses and warehouses are also connected in a wide network of underground artist across cities creating a unique alternative culture. However, this "punk culture" involves challenges and criticism in terms of urban politics in terms of gentrification of poor neighbourhoods, evictions by the authorities and the relationship between aesthetics and political action.
Gilles Baro is a PHD student and lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand. His research interests are, among others, visual culture, urban semiotics and queer studies. Before settling in Johannesburg in early 2012, he documented the underground punk and art scenes in Europe and North America for a decade. The results are photographs and videos of house shows, alternative living spaces and portraits of their actors and inhabitants. In 2008, he participated in the making of the documentary film "Invisible Nation" about the culture and challenges around DIY art spaces on the continent.
Parking Gallery Wednesday 27 November
VANSA Offices, King Kong Building 1st floor 6 Verwey Street New Doornfontein , 2001 Johannesburg, Gauteng
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