Incorporating sculpture, installation, video and performance, Bronwyn Katz’s practice engages with the concept of land as a repository of memory and trauma, reflecting on the notion of place or space as lived experience, and the ability of the land to remember and communicate the memory of its occupation.
Working with found natural materials such as iron ore, or used manmade objects such as foam mattress and bedsprings, Katz’s approach to making is driven by storytelling and intuition. Conceptually, her sculptures refer to the political context of their making, embodying subtle acts of resistance that draw attention to the social constructions and boundaries that continue to define our environments.
For Katz, the language of abstraction is in active opposition to overt representation, allowing her work to be open to multivalent readings. Hers is a minimalism that converses with early forms of abstract art; methods and traditions of mark-making and story-telling that long predate Western Modernism.
Katz has held six solo exhibitions to date, including I turn myself into a star and visit my loved ones in the sky at White Cube in London (2021), Salvaged Letter at Peres Projects in Berlin (2019), / // ! ǂ at blank projects in Cape Town (2019), and A Silent Line, Lives Here at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (2018).
Currently, Katz’s work is included in The Milk of Dreams, the 59th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale, curated by Cecilia Alemani. In 2021, her work was included on Soft Water Hard Stone, the New Museum Triennial of New York, and the Future Generation Art Prize shortlist exhibition. Previous group exhibitions include Upkeep: Everyday Strategies of Care (The Arts Club of Chicago, 2020); We Aim to Live (Zuzeum Art Centre, Riga, 2020); NIRIN (Biennale of Sydney, 2020); and Là où les eaux se mêlent (Biennale de Lyon, 2019). In 2019, she was awarded the First National Bank Art Prize.
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curriculum vitae
1993 Born Kimberley, South Africa
education
2015 BaFA (Hons), University of Cape Town, South Africa
solo exhibitions
2021 I turn myself into a star and visit my loved ones in the sky, White Cube, London
2019 Salvaged Letter, Peres Projects, Berlin
2019 / // ! ǂ, blank projects, Cape Town
2018 A Silent Line, Lives Here, Palais de Tokyo, Paris
2017 Grondskryf, blank projects, Cape Town
2016 Groenpunt, blank projects, Cape Town
selected group exhibitions
2022 The Milk of Dreams, 59th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy
2021 Source Materials, Griffith University Art Museum, Brisbane, Australia
2021 A Line Beyond, AVA Gallery, Cape Town
2021 Soft Water Hard Stone, New Museum Trienial, New Museum, New York
2021 Future Generation Art Prize exhibition, PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv
2021 The River is a Serpent, Frestas – Triennial of Arts 3rd edition
SESC São Paulo, São Paulo
2021 I have made a place, Norval Foundation, Cape Town
2021 This is Not Africa - unlearn what you have learned, ARoS Aarhus Art Museum, Denmark
2021 Territories Between Us, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town
2020 Upkeep: Everyday Strategies of Care, The Arts Club of Chicago, Chicago
2020 We Aim to Live: Contemporary Art from the Zuzāns Collection, Zuzeum Art Centre, Riga, Latvia
2020 NIRIN, 22nd Biennale of Sydney, Sydney
2020 VERBINDING – Connections, Rasa, Kapellen, Belgium
2019 the head the hand, blank projects, Cape Town
2019 Confinement: Politics of Space and Bodies, Contemporary Arts Center, Ohio
2019 Là où les eaux se mêlent (Where the water mingles), Biennale de Lyon, Lyon
2019 Speculative Inquiry #1 (on Abstraction), Michaelis Galleries, Cape Town
2019 The Empathy Lab, Jessica Silverman Gallery, San Francisco
2019 Sculpture, Fonds Régional d’Art Contemporain Réunion, Réunion Island
2019 Material Insanity, Museum of African Contemporary Art Al Maaden, Marrakech
2019 Road to the Unconscious, Peres Projects, Berlin
2018 9 More Weeks, Stevenson Gallery, Johannesburg
2018 blank, Galerie Guido W. Baudach, Berlin
2018 NOT A SINGLE STORY, Nirox Foundation, Johannesburg
2018 Sculpture, Institute of Contemporary Art Indian Ocean, Port Louis, Mauritius
2018 More for less, A4 Arts Foundation, Cape Town
2018 Tell Freedom, Kunsthal Kade, Amersfoort
2017 Le jour qui vient, Galerie des Galeries, Paris
2017 WE CALL IT “AFRICA”, Officine dell’Immagine Gallery, Milan
2016 Figure, blank projects, Cape Town
2016 The Quiet Violence of Dreams, Stevenson Gallery, Johannesburg
2016 Nothing Personal, SMAC Gallery, Stellenbosch, South Africa
2016 12th Dak’Art Biennale, Dakar, Senegal
2016 New Monuments, Commune.1, Cape Town
2016 iQhiya, AVA Gallery, Cape Town
2016 #theopening, Greatmore Studios, Cape Town
2016 3 881 days, blank lab, Cape Town
2015 Revisiting the Latent Archive, Greatmore Studios, Cape Town
awards + residencies
2022 Gasworks Residency, London
2019 First National Bank Art Prize, Johannesburg
2018 SAM Art Projects Residency, Paris
2018 CBK Zuidoost Residency, Amersfoort
2018 NIROX Sculpture Park residency
2015 Simon Gershwin Prize, University of Cape Town
2015 Merit Prize, Sasol New Signatures
