"An independent committee had selected the artist and curator in December to represent the country at the international art event. The two had proposed including a performance centering Gaza. Goliath and Masondo had planned to memorialize the lives of Gazans killed by the Israeli military, including the poet Hiba Abu Nada, as part of the ongoing performance series Elegy. The duo also planned to reference femicide in South Africa and the German-perpetuated Herero and Nama genocide in Namibia during the early 20th century."
""It is nothing short of shameful for the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture to have announced that South Africa will not be presenting a national pavilion at the Venice Biennale this year," Goliath and Mosado said in a statement shared with Hyperallergic. "The space will remain empty: a space of erasure, cancellation, censure.""
"McKenzie halted Goliath and Masondo's participation, arguing that the national pavilion "should not be used to amplify similarly divisive global disputes that do not center South Africa's own story.""
South Africa withdrew its participation from the 2026 Venice Biennale after culture minister Gayton McKenzie scrapped a pavilion proposal by Gabrielle Goliath and curator Ingrid Masondo. An independent committee had selected them in December; their proposal included a performance centering Gaza that would memorialize Gazans killed by the Israeli military and reference femicide in South Africa and the Herero and Nama genocide in Namibia. McKenzie said the national pavilion should not amplify divisive global disputes that do not center South Africa. The cancellation provoked accusations of censorship and statements calling the empty pavilion a space of erasure.
Read at Hyperallergic
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