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Caitlin RossWhile some gallerists tenta-tively maintain that South Africa’seconomy is peripheral enough for their businesses to avoid a head-onattering by the global recession,many have noted a drop in salesover recent months, and some areeven facing closure.Johannesburg institution WarrenSiebrits will close its doors by theend of the month, and a number of galleries failed to make a singlesale at the Johannesburg Art Fair (JAF). Reports seem to indicatethere is a polarized safe-groundon each end of the price spectrum,with sales forging along unscathedfor names like Siopis and Ken-tridge on the high end, and entry-level buyers forking out for printson the other.Philippa Duncan, shared-head atauctioneers Stephen Welz & Co.said work of up to R100 000 is still“relatively easy” to move but be-yond that the bidders have startedneeding some encouragement.It looks as if the downturn haschanged the landscape of art- buying by chasing away thosewho would spend moderately for their own enjoyment or a sideline buying venture, and left mainlyold-guard collectors and minor dabblers.“People are now looking for the big names, for a low-risk invest-ment,” said Neil Dundas, senior curator for the Goodman Gallery,Johannesburg.Some very low-risk investmentswere made in Maggie Laubser,Walter Batiss, Vladimir Tretchikoff and others at the Kebble collectionauction earlier this month, whichgarnered R54 million in sales.Another trend, noted by WarrenSiebrits, is a move away from in-vestment in contemporary towardsmodern art. “That’s what we’vestruggled with at the gallery.”He said more people have becomecollector-dealers, and that is wherethe contemporary art world startsto suffer. Modern art shows more promise of short-term returns,which is not the case with thecontemporary market, in whichwork can take 10 to 15 years toappreciate.With the buyers-market showinga more shrewd and conservativeleaning, the prospect of a 15-year delay on returns is perhaps a bitalarming. Siebrits said he can’t,and won’t, compromise the wayin which he runs his gallery bycutting costs and has opted insteadto take his business online. It costthe gallery around R500 000 to putup a Jo Ratcliffe exhibition, on topof monthly overheads. “Thus far 
we’ve sold four or ve works, and
after the gallery commission we’redown R350/R400 000, on the back of one show.”“If the economic climate doesn’tchange we will all start liter-ally hemorrhaging money. We’renot quite bankrupt yet, but if wecontinued to run at a loss of R1million a year it would not be goodfor anyone.”Joost Bosland, of Michael Ste-venson agreed. “What is probablyquite hard to sell now is commodi-
ed B-list work by big names. If 
 people can choose between anoriginal oil and a Damien Hirst print, they might have gone for theHirst before but people are going back to more serious work.” Thesign of the times is a traditional 2mx 4m oil on canvas.Suzette Bell-Roberts, curator of theBell-Roberts Gallery, mused over whether people in a comfort zoneare more reckless in their tastes.Perhaps, then, in times of loominganxiety folks just don’t want work that is too demanding of them. Thegallery broke even with the sale of one Kevin Brand piece at the JAF,and Suzette said she empathizedwith Siebrits. “He’s one of the veryethical people in the art world.The temptation is always there, toadjust the prices, but once an artisthas established their value it’sunfair to the collectors.” She hascut back overheads where possibleand is spending less on advertising,sending emails rather than posting.David Brodie of the Brodie-Stevenson in Joburg, said whilethere has been a drop, the market“certainly hasn’t been drying up”,though buyers are “looking harder,thinking longer, buying smarter”.“We deal largely with emergingartists, so we pay particular atten-tion to pricing work appropriately.It’s not in anyone’s interests to price way into the stratosphere.People start thinking, well, what isthe value and is it worth it?”Although sales may be limping, public interest is reportedly at ahealthy trot and openings are well-attended. Artspace curator TheresaLizamore has responded to thedownturn by going full-throttle.On 17 May she launched ArtspaceWarehouse in Fairlands, intendedto cater to a wider audience. “It’simportant to look at alternatives”,she said, adding that she is invest-ing a lot more in marketing andexposure and negotiating pitcheswith artists. “You have to consider your market”. The cheapest work currently on show at the Artspacein Rosebank is priced at betweenR2900 and R8000 and a sale is yetto be made. Neil Dundas offered similar advice. “You have to be sensitiveto what the spending trends are. If you’re showing an established art-ist, include some major work butalso put out smaller stuff. Look atexhibiting things in a modest pricerange.”One has to wonder what the most
up-to-date denition of “mod
-est” is if quality work of R2900 islanguishing on walls in a popular gallery.“Anyone who says they’re notfeeling the recession is lying, or very lucky,” said Bosland.
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Love of Art in the Time of Recession
 June 2009 | Supplement to The South African Art Times | E-mail: subs@arttimes.co.za | Member of the Global Art Information Group Work by Andre Stead to be seen at the Good Food and Wine Show - Cape Town International Convention Centre from 28 May. For more details see www.andresteadsculpture.com
 
Tragic Death of Arts Benefactor Peter Fairhead, 64, chairman of Fairheads Trust Company, CapeTown was killed on 22nd Marchwhen his new Harley Davidson bike ran out of control and threwhim over a highway railing sixtymetres below to his death.Professionally, Peter trained as both a lawyer and an accountant.He obtained his degrees at Stel-lenbosch University. He joinedthe family business at the age of 24 where he developed particular expertise in advising individualsand families on the complex andsophisticated business of managingworldwide wealth.Peter Fairhead was well-knownand respected in Cape Town familyand business circles as the Chair-man of Fairheads Trust Company,one of the oldest independent trust
and duciary companies in South
Africa.But he was equally well-knownand loved by the organisers andresidents of community-basedorganisations in and around CapeTown.These include Camphill VillageWest Coast, where Peter was chair-man for nearly 30 years, Ncede-luntu Sanctuary Trust in SomersetWest (run by Mama Lumka, the“wheelbarrow saint”), and theUCT Clanwilliam project whichexposes the youth of an impover-ished community to art and dance.Funding by Fairhead Trust coupledwith Peter’s philanthropicinspiration were the guiding forces behind the Clanwilliam Arts andCulture project. The project takesthe form of an annual visual anddramatic enactment in Clanwilliamof San legends, in which the area isrich in history.The local learners explore thetheme in a week-long workshopinvolving dance, storytelling,shadow puppetry, and arts andcrafts, such as the construction of 
larger-than-life illuminated gures
 based on traditional San themes.Annually they parade through thestreets by night singing and danc-ing and acting out their chosentheme. It is one of the high-lights of Clanwilliam’s commu-nity project activities and eagerlyawaited by the participants eachyear.Peter Fairhead is survived by asister and brother, Jill and Tyrrel,as well as his wife Barbara andhis six stepdaughters and their children.
02 BUSINESS ART | JUNE 09 OBITUARY
OBITUARY 
Peter Fairhead - Arts Benefactor 
 
 Given the limited size of the SAart world, it’s common for peopleto wear more than one hat. Fewwear as many as Teresa Lizamore:consultant to two major institu-tional collections and, for the pastfew weeks, curator of not just oneut two commercial gallery spaces.And, in a way, it all happened bychance.Formerly a secretary, when in 1982Sasol moved from Sandton to their since much enlarged Rosebank HQshe applied for a job in their PR department. She was asked by thenCEO Joe Stegmann if she woulde interested in helping to set up acorporate art collection, and whenshe said yes, was promptly sentto RAU (now the University of Johannesburg) for three years, atSasol’s expense, to study the his-tory of art.There she studied under LeoniSchmidt, who became a mentor and close friend. Schmidt was ap- pointed to the advisory committeeof art professionals Sasol set up.She was also already consulting toRand Merchant Bank, in which ca-
 pacity Lizamore rst assisted her,
then succeeded her when Schmidtemigrated some 15 years ago.Stegmann was another strong earlysupporter, and Lizamore describes building up the Sasol collection asa “wonderful journey.” Twenty-odd years ago it was possible to buy a lot of work at what todaylook ridiculously low prices.Moreover, the aim was to buildup a representative contemporarycollection, which could meanacquiring controversial pieces.Stegmann refused to be swayed bystaff protests, which Lizamore sayswould not be so easy to ignore inthese more democratic days.Lizamore worked full-time for Sasol for 10 years, subsequently
rst part-time and now as a
consultant. This brought freedomto diversify, as Sasol didn’t allowfull-time staff to take other work.
Consulting to RMB was the rst
fruit of this, and though that col-lection receives less exposurethan Sasol’s, it comprises 1 500works, not that far short of Sasol’s2 000. But it’s a very differentkind of collection: while there areno claims to representivity, some
may nd it more accessible, as the
main, and by no means unworthy,objective is just to put visually ap- pealing art on the walls.
Then, in 2000, she fullled a long-
standing ambition by opening the
rst Artspace gallery at her home
in Fairland. This operated until2007, with much success. She
considers it a beautiful space, lled
with good exhibitions, but in timefelt a need to move to a morecentral location offering better exposure. So in March 2008 she moved tothe art strip in Parkwood. The tim-ing could hardly have been worse, just months before the art marketwent into meltdown worldwide.But even that hasn’t deterred her from another venture.A common problem on the artstrip is storage space, so Lizamoredecided to redevelop her old gal-lery both as a store and a new kindof venue. So last month saw thelaunch of the satellite ArtspaceWarehouse back in Fairland, whichfunctions as a salon where, in thewords of the blurb, “clients canview stock at leisure in a relaxedenvironment.”Alternatively, they can view her entire stock on screen, then haveindividual works brought to Park-wood for physical inspection.Like Artspace itself, ArtspaceWarehouse is available for hire for  private functions, seminars andworkshops. While it is not prima-rily an exhibition space, it mayhost exhibitions from time to time:the launch featured an exhi - bition around Verenka Paschke’sillustrated book, Stil Lewe, whichis still running.Sasol has always regarded itsart collection as part of its socialresponsibility programme, and Liz-amore extends that philosophy toher other activities.Sasol itself sponsors the an-nual New Signatures competition,which claims to be the oldest inSA. For some years, it also spon-sored the Sasol Wax award, nowsadly discontinued. And regular open days are not only opportuni-ties to roam the Rosebank HQ toview the latest acquisitions, theyhave also been used to showcasevarious musical groups from must,however inelegantly, be referred toas the previously disadvantaged.At RMB, it was decided in 2006to liven up the staff canteen walls by commissioning local artists to
 paints murals reecting the corpo
-rate culture of Traditional Values,Innovative Ideas. Eight up-and-coming artists were commissionedto paint six 2,4 m x 1.3 m murals(two works were created by twoartists jointly) which are now partof its collection and permanentlyon view in the canteen.And last year, Artspace launchedits own mentorship project for established artists to give guid-ance to new artists. Last year’smentors were Leora Farber, TanyaPoole and Walter Oltmann; thisyear’s, Wilma Cruise, Kagiso PatMautloa, David Koloane, andUsha Seejarim, so the projecthas obviously found favour withtop creative talents who want to plough something back into thecommunity.Given her corporate links, Liz-amore is in a good position togauge the impact of the recessionon corporate spending on the arts.While it would be improper for 
her to comment specically on
the plans of Sasol or RMB, it’sclear she sees this as a vulnerablearea, “soft” spending in contrast torecipients like health or education. It’s a widely shared fear, not justin SA but internationally. One canonly hope that the efforts of per-suasive advocates like Lizamorewill minimise the impact, andthat her commercial ventures willcontinue to prosper. Michael Coulson
PEOPLE JUNE 09 | BUSINESS ART 03
 
Teresa Lizamore - Art Space Johannesburg
One of the themes that I picked upon that this year’s Joburg Art Fair was a trend in intimate, personal, psycho-sexual paintings. Paintingsthat grapple with psychologicalrather than socio-political realitiesor conceptual trickery, they exploreloss, desire, memory, transience,an uncertain connection to the no-tion of place or home…Interestingly, these paintings camemostly out of Cape Town, with astrong showing at the João Ferreirastand. I was drawn again and againto the hazy, valium-seeped paint-ings of Sanell Aggenbach, whosemuted palette and private renegadenarratives recall the poems of Sylvia Plath, Michael Cunning-ham’s landmark novel, The Hours,or Sam Mendes’s recent screenadaptation of Richard Yates’s 1961novel, Revolutionary Road.It is as if Aggenbach comes to her subjects dazed and half in a dream,with only one foot in this fast andfurious world of ours. Her portraitshave a strange, gloomy allure,drawing one into a ghostly world
in which one cares ercely but
mutely, as if in a dream. Also atJoão Ferreira were the odd Freud-ian gymnastics conjured in Mark Hipper’s black and white oils, andthe hauntingly nostalgic paintingsof Louise Linder, which seemto recall some kind of lost idyll, being based on small black andwhite photographs from her child-hood in Mozambique. I have long been a fan of the lyrical and oddlyincidental glimpses of life capturedin the quietly sensual paintings of Tom Culberg, who seems to havemigrated from João Ferreira toWhatiftheworld…And there are others who gravitatetowards these twisted, privatedalliances in painting. But mostlythey are from Cape Town or repre-sented by the Cape Town galleries,while the focus in Johannesburgseems to be more outward looking,with a strong foothold in photogra- phy cerebral/conceptual engage-ments with form, social documen-tary excursions, installation andurban interventions.That is why I was so refreshed thisweekend to sneak into Brodie/Stevenson on a quiet Saturdayafternoon, while nobody else wasabout, and have Mary Wafer’s paintings all to myself. Wafer isone of the few contemporary High-veld painters who approach thecanvas with the same psychologi-cal depth that I was drawn to at theFair. Her paintings are darkly lyri-
cal, yet at the same time ercely
committed to the prosaic concrete
world in which we nd ourselves
up here on the Reef. Her solo isno disappointment. And with thefabulously stoic title, The frontier is never somewhere else, it doesn’tget more grittily Joburg than this.‘My paintings take the urban land-scape of Johannesburg as subjectmatter… The overwhelminglychallenging materiality of the citydemands a constant navigation,attention and vigilance, a perpetualre-negotiation and re-interpretationof the particular imagined and realspaces we occupy,’ writes Wafer.‘Because the city is envisioned andexperienced differently by every person in it, the whole, what makesJoburg Joburg, seems to existalmost entirely in the imaginationsof its inhabitants.’Being greatly enamoured of Wafer’s passionately matter-of-fact canvases, I purposely did notattend the opening and waited untila few weeks later when it was safeto soak up the show without theinterference of the sipping throngs.This silent mode of absorptionseemed the perfect context inwhich to receive these images,which are a wonderful kind of headtrip.Wafer’s freeway painting thatadorns the cover of Ivan Vladislavic’s novel, The ExplodedView, is forever burned into myconsciousness, and the titles of her paintings do not betray thatinherently literary mental tattoo.Disjunctive phrases like (Murder)
When our mouths are lled with
the uninvited tongues of others or menacing sentences like I needto be in a town where they knowwhat I’m like evoke truncatednarratives that offer clues into thedepopulated scenes before you.But the words and details are never enough to tell a full story – morelike forensic tidbits that provokedislocated red herring thoughts.The titles also thicken the crime plot instigated by two paintings in particular, which feature little morethan left over splotches of blood.I think what I love most aboutthese urban abstractions is the paradox they evoke in relation tothe notion of Romance. At surfacelevel, they could be construed ascynical, abstract depictions of aharsh and soulless city. But thatwould be overlooking the passionand sensuality of the brushwork.Each smudge, blur, slash anddrip of oil paint seems like somestrange oblique homage to thisinscrutable city.And the abstraction of buildingsreaches moments of transcendent beauty – black, grey, muted beautyinterrupted by the unexpected brilliant green of Astroturf or thedazzling illumination of neonlight at night. These are paintingsthat seem so beyond any sense of Romance as pertains to the 18thcentury European tradition. Butlook again. Are they not deeplysolitary engagements with thelandscape? Are they not passion-ately concerned with the sublime play of light? Is the painter’srelationship with Johannesburg nota doomed kind of love? These arethe kinds of questions that springto mind when faced with Wafer’s paintings. And why I am at onewith her description of painting asa ‘conceptual practice that operatesas a platform for investigatingsocial realities’. Sometimes peopleforget that painting can be the mostconceptual art form of all.
Images:
(Above) Mary Wafer (Murder) Black and Blue2009Oil on canvas40 x 50 cmImage appears courtesy Brodie/Stevenson(Left) Mary Wafer An End has a Start2008 Oil on canvas105 x 150 cmImage appearscourtesy Brodie/Stevenson
  Alex Dodd
Crowds spill out of ArtSpace Gallery on its opening night
Photo: Willie Mojafe
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