17 Aandbloem Street, 2004

Betacam numérique, PAL, couleur, son


This video was produced in association with Very Real Time, a research programme for contemporary art that is active in two of the major South African cities : Cape Town and Johannesburg. One of the first projects from this programme took place in 2003 with the organisation of a one-month residency for seven artists, in Cape Town. At the end of this residency, Michael Blum had more than thirteen hours of rushes to produce a video. He made a work similar to a report, combining interviews and documentary images.


For fifty-seven minutes, he follows the story of Vredehoek, a "young" neighbourhood in Cape Town, situated between the downtown area and the suburbs, where various foreign communities cohabitate. The artist took a house in the neighbourhood as his main subject, whose address became the title of the work : 17 Aandbloem Street. As though conducting a neighbourhood survey, he interviews each of the various protagonists one by one about the history of the house. The portrait of 17 Aandbloem Street is thus built up through the testimonies of the current inhabitants but also through reports from former owners and residents. The characters are clearly identified and named : there's Jean Meeran, the current occupant, Lindsay Clowes, the co-owner, Iain Louw, architect, Zariah Dagnell, real estate agent, a few neighbours, plus Dichara Pillay, the cousin of a former flatmate, and Michael, a homeless man who lives nearby.


Michael Blum uses the very local situation of this neighbourhood in order to extend and apply it to a broader sociological and political dimension. The characters can be seen as a sociological panel, chosen in order to take stock of evolutions in the country since the end of Apartheid. The first part of the video highlights the personal relationship each of the characters has with the house. It also stresses the progression of the middle class, but also that of social housing in this neighbourhood. In the second part, Michael Blum relates an important event : the Green Patch party. An epilogue to the video and the final outcome of the artist's work, this festive gathering takes place in Green Patch, a small park-like area located in front of the house. Friends and neighbours gather here for more than ten hours, to share a big meal, mix and mingle, in striking contrast with the former apartheid regime. This gathering may be seen as the symbol of change in South Africa. The Green Patch Party was in fact an initiative of Michael Blum's, and it was by chance that it happened to take place on 24 September, a national public holiday (Heritage Day), celebrating the cultural heritage of all the peoples of South Africa.


In his works, Michael Blum has often used fiction, for instance at the Istanbul Biennale, where he devised a feminist Turkish character, Safiye Behar. How does 17 Aandbloem Street relate to reality, if Michael Blum orientates it by organising the party that inspires the second part of the work? Does the house on 17 Aandbloem Street really exist? Is it a documentary or a fiction produced by the artist to provide a realistic vision of post-Apartheid South Africa?


Priscilia Marques
Translated by Anna Knight


http://www.veryrealtime.co.za/introduction.htm