Michael Stevenson

Sold

2005
leather jacket, rubber inner tube, ribbon, blouse, bust
61 x 58 x 67cm

below: sketch for performance

A biker’s jacket modified through the addition of a hump made of inner tube stitched together with red ribbon, Igqirha lendlela is also a performance piece that requires the jacket’s wearer to mingle with people in social situations. Hlobo writes:

The character hopes to behave like any normal person would. He’d visit exhibitions, go to restaurants, window shop, go to libraries, meet people, etc. He carries himself in a way that proves he has pride and does not find anything wrong with himself.
The title is derived from the Xhosa choral song Igqirha lendlela nguqongqothwane. This means that the dung beetle is the doctor of the road. Dung beetles’ amazing ability to roll balls of dung using their hind legs says a lot to me about their courage and confidence. They are not intimidated by having to move things larger than their bodies. The song refers to those who are wise and educated (in various ways) and says that they are the ones who know the way forward.
The altered jacket and the performance allude to the heavy baggage we carry as South Africans. The fact that the baggage is put at the back of the garment suggests that we will work hard at putting the past where it belongs – behind us.
I used rubber from inner tubes because of its relation to my previous works, and stitched the pieces together using red ribbon. Red is such a dramatic colour – we use it as a symbol of love; Aids is coded by the same colour; it warns us of danger when driving on the streets; it is the same colour that was used to mark the Zulu and baSotho men who fought on the British side in the 1879 battle of Rorke’s Drift.
The motorcycle jacket came from a second-hand clothing shop. It bears a Triton logo on the top left pocket. Apparently the brand name Triton was born at the end of the 1960s when Norton decided to put a Triumph Bonneville engine into his famous Featherbed frame. The jacket is made in Korea but the Triton is a British idea. In the small pocket I found a piece of paper from a fortune cookie, reading: ‘You will pass a difficult test that will make you happier.’
The inside label is illustrated with two roses and reads ‘a rose is a rose’. This supports the conversation I attempt to create with the materials I use in my works. It relates to things that are hard and fragile, things that are lovely and inviting yet dangerous. One can relate that to our heritage in South Africa – it is beautiful and inviting, yet capable of inflicting pain.

Hlobo was included on the exhibition In the making: materials and process at Michael Stevenson in August 2005. A graduate of the Wits Technikon, he spent three months this year in residence at the Thami Mnyele Foundation studios in Amsterdam. His first solo show will take place at Michael Stevenson in August 2006.