Gabrielle Goliath loses Court Battle against Minister Gayton McKenzie over Venice Biennale Decision
Gabrielle Goliath has lost her legal bid to overturn a decision by Minister of Sport, Arts and Culture Gayton McKenzie to halt South Africa’s participation at the 61st Venice Biennale.
The High Court in Pretoria on Wednesday dismissed Goliath’s urgent application to reinstate her planned artwork for the exhibition.
Goliath’s piece, titled Elegy, was selected by an independent committee to be exhibited in Venice. Elegy is a performance and video installation made up of eight ritual laments. It explores interconnected histories of grief, from femicide in South Africa and the erasure of Nama life-worlds in Namibia, to the displacement and killing of Palestinian civilians. The ruling means Goliath will not represent South Africa at the international art event.
In early January, South Africa's Minister of Culture, McKenzie cancelled the South African pavilion showing and described the work as “highly divisive”. He said the decision was based on concerns about the piece’s content in relation to the ongoing global conflict.
“It would not be wise nor defensible for South Africa to support an art installation against a country currently accused of genocide while we are also fielding unjustified accusations of genocide,” McKenzie said.
“The Department of Sport, Arts and Culture cannot support such a highly divisive political narrative on what remains our platform as a country.”
Goliath expressed disappointment in the ruling. “These are punitive measures, enacted against those the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture is mandated to support, and will certainly discourage others in the arts community from attempting to defend their constitutional rights in court,” a statement from her team read.
She also indicated that her team is considering an appeal. “We believe this ruling sets a dangerous precedent, jeopardising the rights of artists, curators and creatives in South Africa to freedom of expression – freedom to dissent. It goes without saying that we will be contesting this ruling through an appeal,” the statement read.
Main Image: Gabrielle Goliath, Elegy—Noluvo Swelindawo, 2017. Performance view, ICA Live Art Festival, Cape Town. Photo: Courtesy of the Institute for Creative Art.