The workshop „Arts – Archives – Performances” is taking place between 1-5th August 2022 at the Centre of the Less Good Idea, in Johannesburg. 

The workshop is hosted by the SO Academy, an arm of the Centre of the Less Good Idea: https://lessgoodidea.com/ in the framework of the research project „Animated Images, Controversial Memories [CINEMAF]”. Le Centre Régional Francophone de Recherches Avancées en Sciences Sociales (CEREFREA Villa Noël) of the University of Bucharest is an institution member of the project.

The workshop engages in an artistic reflection on the issues of remediation, analysis and reuse of filmic materials produced in controversial historical contexts. It is conceived as a space for exchange and dialogue between artists, curators and scholars whose practices are devoted to the material traces of colonial history.

The workshop is animated by Bronwyn LACE (Vienna/Johannesburg) and Phala Ookeditse PHALA (Johannesburg) with the participation of Christine BARTHE (Paris); Thulani CHAUKE (Johannesburg); Adewole FALADE (Vienna); Julien FAURE-CONERTON (Paris); Hugo Felipe Idarraga FRANCO (Bogota); Pélagie GBAGUIDI (Brussels); Juan Camilo GONZALVES (Bogota); Monica HEINTZ (Paris); Didier Marcel HOUENOUDE (Abomey-Calavi); Bongile Gorata LECOGE – ZULU( Johannesburg); Vusi MDOYI; Teresa Phuti MOJELA (Johannesburg); Angelo MOUSTAPHA (Brussels/Benin); Damiana OTOIU (Bucharest); Thabo RAPOO (Johannesburg); Calvin RATLADI (Johannesburg); Jo RACTLIFFE (Cape Town); Lisl PONGER (Vienna); Alexander SCHELLOW (Brussels); Anna SEIDERER (Paris); Thuthuka SIBISI (Johannesburg); Penny SIOPIS (Cape Town); Jane TAYLOR (Cape Town); Sabine THEUNISSEN (Brussels); Khadija von ZINNENBURG CARROLL (Vienna).

Founded by William Kentridge and Bronwyn Lace in November 2016, the name of the Centre of the Less Good Idea derives in part from a Tswana proverb: ‘If the good doctor can’t cure you, find the less good doctor’. The Centre aims to nurture artists in finding the less good idea, and creates and supports experimental, collaborative and cross-disciplinary arts projects. It provides a physical and immaterial space to pursue incidental discoveries made in the process of producing work. “Often, you start with a good idea. It might seem crystal clear at first, but when you put it to work the cracks and fissures emerge in its surface, and they cannot be ignored. It is often the secondary ideas, those less good ideas found in trying to address the cracks in the first idea, that become the core of the work…the intention is to provide a forum for these less good ideas – arguing that in the act of playing with an idea, you can recognise those things that you didn’t know in advance, but knew were somewhere inside you”, says Kentridge about the intentions of Centre.
It is a space to follow impulses, connections and revelations. It’s a physical space for people to bring together text, performance, image, and dance because an ensemble sees the world differently to how an individual does. It’s a safe space for failure, for projects to be tried and discarded because they do not work. It’s a space to develop work which doesn’t yet have a natural home in a theatre, museum or gallery.