Nineteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

I explore the role of visual and conceptual art – and the business of the aesthetic – in Ivan Vladislavić’s 2004 book The Exploded View. Vladislavić, a South African writer, has long played with the boundary between language and art, especially South African contemporary art. Comprising four interlinked narratives, The Exploded View has generated extensive debate about whether it is a novel or a collection of short stories. I propose a different way of reading it entirely: as a work of conceptual art. The book, which originated as one part of a tripartite art exhibition – a ‘joint work’ by Vladislavić, artist Joachim Schönfeldt, and critic Andries Walter Oliphant – not only serves as a literary commentary on the process of making art and the consumerism of the ‘artworld’, but also embodies them. This is done particularly through the story Curiouser (a play on the words “curio” and “user”), about an artist who repurposes found objects into genocide-themed exhibitions. My paper is based on research into Vladislavić’s oeuvre and into (South African) art and literary theory, extensive material research, and dialogue with Joachim Schönfeldt (whose art prompted the writing of this book) and with the curators at Wits Art Museum (WAM) in Johannesburg. Based on this research and my own reading, I argue that The Exploded View functions as a work of conceptual art, interrogating the function of art – itself included – in a postcolonial, neoliberal society, and the appropriation of mass-produced objects and the exploitation of human labour.