Installation view, 2016

Dineo Seshee Bopape
1981, Polokwane, South Africa. Lives in Johannesburg, South Africa

For the 32nd Bienal, Dineo Seshee Bopape presents a site-specific installation titled :indeed it may very well be the ___________itself (2016). The installation is comprised of unevenly distributed compressed soil structures of various sizes in which assorted emotive objects are placed in pit constellations that resemble the structure of the Morabaraba (Mancala) and Diketo games. The objects include casts of an uterus, gold leaves, minerals, healing herbs and pieces of clay molded by a clenched fist. The work is a contemplation of ideas and forms of containment and displacement, occupation and hosting, as well as the implied sociohistorical politics of landlessness. Bopape’s work is an intimate protest that prompts us to capture fleeting memories. The compressing of soil as a gesture of remembering brings the viewer closer to what has been deemed immaterial and/or eroded through history.