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WITS School of Arts have recently launched a new residency.

According to the Africa Centre, “TheSubstation Residency: Dislocating the Studio is a pilot project set up by theWitwatersrand University Division of Fine Arts in Johannesburg, South Africa,that is structured as a challenge to the space of the studio.Theartist’s studio or Atelier in its modernist incarnation is a pseudo sacredplace where rarefied art objects are produced. Implicit in this configurationis a hierarchical, elitist and commodity driven view of the fine arts. Objectswithin the studio are open to manipulation, they are transitory and in processof becoming. Once the object leaves the studio however, it becomes fixed as Artwork.This standard operation of the studio and artwork is one that has increasinglybeen challenged and rearranged as artistic practice becomes less tied to objectproduction and more orientated to processes of temporality and relationalencounters. The studio is not simply an atelier but can look more like alibrary, a playground, a meeting point, a laboratory or even a researchfacility.Thispilot residency project aims to push against ideas of the studio. Artists,theorists, curators, filmmakers, activists or performers are invited torethink, to re-imagine the studio in a real time engagement with the SubstationProject Space and the audiences that visit it.TheSubstation Residency opportunity on offer will run for a month between the 1August 2010 to the 7 November 2010. The exact dates will be formalised with theartist chosen to participate in the residency. 
The following items will beprovided to the artist participating in the residency: Accommodation; an artistfee; and a per diem. Budget for the production of the work will be drawn up indiscussion with the art practitioner.”The exitingSubstation Resident artists are Abdularazaq Awofeso and Sepadi Moruthane. Thetwo work together in a variety of media. Their collaborative work, which WITSdescribes as work which “interrogate(s) and negotiate(s) ideas aroundcontemporary and traditional art practices” was shown on 14 April 2011.

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