{"id":1960,"date":"2015-05-18T10:44:44","date_gmt":"2015-05-18T10:44:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesouthafricanpavilion.co.za\/?page_id=1960"},"modified":"2016-10-05T07:08:58","modified_gmt":"2016-10-05T07:08:58","slug":"gerald-machona","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/gerald-machona\/","title":{"rendered":"Gerald Machona"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AVZ6201-LR.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2129\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AVZ6201-LR.jpg\" alt=\"_AVZ6201 LR\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AVZ6201-LR.jpg 800w, https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AVZ6201-LR-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AVZ6201-LR-750x501.jpg 750w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>People From Far Away<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/em><i>Ndiri Afronaut <\/i>(I am an Afronaut), 2012<br \/>\nDecommissioned Zimbabwean dollar, foam padding, fabric, wood, Perspex, rubber, plastic tubing, nylon thread, gold leaf<br \/>\nc. 190 x 60 x 50 cm<br \/>\nCourtesy Goodman Gallery<\/p>\n<p>Single-channel film, duration 12 min 57 sec<br \/>\n2012<br \/>\nCourtesy Goodman Gallery<\/p>\n<p>\u2018People from far away\u2019 is derived from the Shona word <i>vabvakure<\/i>, which is used to describe a \u2018foreigner\u2019. Following the political and economic collapse of Zimbabwe in the late nineties, thousands of Zimbabweans migrated into neighbouring countries. South Africa hosts the largest number of Zimbabwean migrants in this diaspora. In 2008, a wave of xenophobic violence spread through South Africa, images of which were seen throughout the world. (In a horrible moment of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu, this moment is being repeated in South Africa in 2015.) Many of the victims of this violence were Zimbabweans. People were targeted through a process of profiling which assumed that authentic South Africans are lighter in complexion or fluent in an indigenous language. This resulted in a number of South African casualties. Such beliefs have complicated the idea of what constitutes \u2018insider\u2019 and \u2018outsider\u2019 in South African society, pitting \u2018native\u2019 against \u2018alien\u2019 and perpetuating an exclusive sense of belonging that is reminiscent of apartheid doctrine. There is a growing need in the post-colony to deconstruct these notions of individual and collective identity, since \u2018nations\u2019, \u2018nationalisms\u2019 and \u2018citizenry\u2019 are no longer defined solely through indigeneity or autochthony.<\/p>\n<p>Gerald Machona is a Zimbabwe-born visual and performance artist. He received his Master\u2019s degree in fine art (sculpture) from Rhodes University in 2013 and holds a BA degree in fine art (new media) from the University of Cape Town. In 2011 Machona was selected by <i>Business Day<\/i> and the FNB Joburg Art Fair as one of the top ten young artists practicing in South Africa. He works in sculpture, performance, new media, photography and film. A notable aspect of his work is his innovative use of currency\u2014particularly decommissioned Zimbabwean dollars\u2014through which he explores migrant and diaspora narratives as well as the creative limits of visual art production. He has participated in group exhibitions such as <i>Making Way<\/i> at the Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg (2013); <i>The Night Show<\/i>, Goodman Gallery, Cape Town (2011); <i>The Geography of Somewhere<\/i>, Stevenson, Johannesburg (2011); and <i>US II<\/i>, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town (2010). Machona is a recipient of a Mellon Scholarship and a member of the Visual and Performing Arts of Africa (ViPAA) research group at Rhodes University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>People From Far Away Ndiri Afronaut (I am an Afronaut), 2012 Decommissioned Zimbabwean dollar, foam padding, fabric, wood, Perspex, rubber, plastic tubing, nylon thread, gold leaf c. 190 x 60 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1960","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1960"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1960\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2162,"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1960\/revisions\/2162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sapavilion.partsandlabour.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}