Nelisiwe Xaba
Nelisiwe Xaba lives and works as a dancer and choreographer in Johannesburg. Xaba began her vibrant career in dance almost thirty years ago. She received a scholarship to study at the Johannesburg Dance Foundation, as well as the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance in London.
Before launching her solo career, Xaba worked with Pact Dance Company and Free Flight Dance Company. Since then Xaba has been involved in various multi-media projects, collaborating with choreographers, fashion designers, poets and other different forms of artists.
Her solo works and collaborations, including Plasticization, They Look At Me and That’s All They Think, Sakhozi Says “Non” to the Venus, Correspondances, (a collaboration with Kettly Noel) Black!...White?, Uncles & Angels and Fremde Tanz have toured extensively in South Africa and internationally.
Xaba participated in the 2013 Venice Biennale at the South African pavillion, performing adaptations from The Venus. She was awarded the FNB Art Prize for the Uncles & Angels film created with Mocke J van Veuren that same year. In 2016, she created Urban Mermaid for the 50th anniversary of the Goodman Gallery and also performed the piece at the Berliner Festspiele. In 2017, Xaba created Bang Bang Wo, a solo performance that interrogates the politics of 'help.' The piece was funded by the South African National Arts Council and premiered at The Centre For The Less Good Idea.
Nelisiwe Xaba’s recent collaboration Hominal/Xaba, with the Swiss dancer/choreographer Marie-Caroline Hominal, premiered in 2019 and is currently touring. Xaba’s sound installation, Nzinga was created for the 2020 Virtual National Arts Festival in Makhanda. In collaboration with Mocke J van Veuren, Xaba initiated Fake News, a dance project that employs live video projection to engage young students of movement, film and multimedia from academic and non academic institutions. Fake News encourages both the audience and participates to consider and question the idea of perceived truth.
Xaba has started InfluenZart, a live art, video and sound installation platform that first showcased at Carfax, on the 2nd of September 2022. Xaba is the recipient of the prestigious Villa Albertine residency in NewYork.
NELISIWE XABA
vRot
Mould, Decay, The state of the nation
vRot
A new performance artwork by Nelisiwe Xaba
Women’s Day, Wednesday 9 August 2023, 12:30-13:00
GSA Room; Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture; Bunting Road Campus; University of Johannesburg
Neli Xaba’s new performance artwork – vRot – forms part of the exhibition
SYM | BIO | ART
INTRA-ACTING AT THE CRITICAL NODE BETWEEN BIOTECHNOLOGY AND CONTEMPORARY ART
currently on at the FADA gallery, Bunting Road Campus, University of Johannesburg.
In their performance, Xaba delves into the realms of live art, biology, science and philosophy, blurring the boundaries between beauty and the grotesque. By seeing mould as a kind of beautiful flower, Xaba appreciates its gradual growth that requires a specific, conducive environment to flourish, ironically, much like the monstrous nature of corruption. In vRot, they use mould cay as a material metaphor for the levels of corruption in South Africa, and the impact this has on socio-economic issues in the country. By using mould as a signifier of decay, the artist points to the way in which processes of deterioration take place over time, rather than happening in a sudden or immediate way. The performance takes place on a mirrored stage, where a knitted blanket, inspired by the colors of the mould, forms the primary feature in conjunction with the artist’s body.
In vRot, Xaba draws parallels to the emotions one might experience while listening to the news in South Africa, particularly concerning the governance of the ruling party. As an artist, Xaba embraces deprecating humor as a coping mechanism. Through the work, they acknowledge that corruption extends beyond the South African government and permeates various societal aspects that have not yet been wholly acknowledged. They contemplate whether their work effectively reaches a broad public audience or remains confined within academic and art spheres. Their aspiration is for their art to resonate with a wide audience and for it to provoke and stimulate discussion so that it transcends being mere entertainment.
Xaba’s performance will be preceded by a walkabout of the exhibition in the FADA Gallery from 11:00 to 12:00.
Images from vRot performance: Nelisiwe Xaba and Joshua Brayton Arnold.
