The University of Pretoria Museums (UP Museums) celebrated the opening of its new Artology exhibition and the launch of the accompanying Artology book at the Javett-UP Art Centre on 19 April 2023.
The Artology exhibition will open to the public from 20 April 2023 until 31 July 2023. Both exhibition and book offer audiences a selection of iconic artworks covering the UP Museums’ 100-year history of collecting art, starting in 1922 with the first donation to the University, a 1915 lithograph portrait of Paul Kruger by JH Pierneef, up to 2022 with the acquisition of the UP Museums’ first augmented reality painting, by the award-winning young artist Andrea du Plessis.
Dr Sian Tiley-Nel, Head of the UP Museums, explained that the UP Museums first coined the new term Artology in 2022, “in response to deepening modern curatorial knowledge as embedded within a university museum context. The UP Museums has conceptualised, created, and presented Artology as a renewed and innovative idea that is not yet listed in the Cambridge Dictionary.”
The Artology book presents more than 300 items from the UP Museums’ roughly 20 000-piece collections and archives. Sifting and classifying the iconic works that best embody 100 years of institutional collections was a difficult thought, Dr Tiley-Nel said, as was the idea of choosing only 300 of the 20 000 works to be included in the book. The exhibition includes 95 works.
The launch event was held in the Bridge Gallery at the Javett-UP with museum patrons, distinguished guests, and members of the wider UP community in attendance. In his speech welcoming guests, Professor Tawana Kupe, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of UP, said, “Under the stewardship, conservation, and curation of the UP Museums, this institution has been reshaping its operations, its art and cultural collections, how it engages with a diversity of audiences, and what it exhibits.”
He added that Artology is also a response to the pandemic-driven digital acceleration that has affected the museum experience. “The exhibition features artwork labels with QR codes which leads the visitor directly to the internationally acclaimed Google Arts and Culture platform, which brings over 4 000 museum collections into a single and exciting digital realm… I am pleased to announce that in a few months this Artology exhibition will be launched online as a pocket gallery, available 24/7 and accessible from anywhere in the world.”
The UP Museums defines Artology as:
Artology
[aːt/ ol-uh-jee]
Noun
… The study of art or an object as art. A branch of knowledge or research strategy applied to curatorship in a university museum context, including practical and theoretical perspectives. A variety of responses and methods to art-making, physical, or visceral experiences. The innovative ability to transform new information into a thing, ideas, processes, and new knowledge into the visual or art. A specialised fusion of mutually creative research, and a transdisplinary approach to objects in collections and archives. © University of Pretoria Museums
The works in the Artology exhibition and book were acquired between 1922 and the present, from when UP was still known as the Transvaal University College (or TUKS), emerging after World War One and at a time when there were major developments in research in South Africa. Acquisitions were made through purchase, donation, request, fieldwork, or permanent loans. “To reframe how contemporary university museums fill gaps in narratives, representations of identity, and institutional memory as recording both the past and the present, it is crucial to include current artworks and the most recent purchases,” Dr Tiley-Nel said.
Artology also aims to raise awareness of the importance and value of university museums in higher education, and the valuable role of active collections as part and parcel of the research infrastructure.
The exhibition is co-curated by the UP Museums’ Curator of Art Exhibitions and Galleries, Lelani Nicolaisen, and the Curator of the UP Museums Collections, Gerard de Kamper.
“It has been an immense privilege to curate the Artology exhibition,” Nicolaisen said. “Working with an expansive and valuable collection that includes some of South Africa’s greatest artists and some not-so-well-known artists makes curation even more rewarding, as artworks ultimately tell their own stories.”
De Kamper echoed his colleague, adding, “The exhibition leads to another 100 years of UP excellence; of leading the way in collecting, archiving, conserving, and researching art in South Africa.”
Gabi Ngcobo, Curatorial Director of the Javett-UP Art Centre, said, “The Javett-UP appreciates the significance of this curatorial activation that we hope is the first of others to come. Our publics will now have an opportunity to experience and engage with a modest selection of a much larger art and archive collection in the care of the University of Pretoria. We are looking forward to taking this journey together with UP Museums, and to begin to mediate the ideas that informed the acquisition of more than 20 000 works in 100 years at the University of Pretoria.”
The Artology book can be ordered directly from the University of Pretoria Museums and is available for R750 (excluding postage). Bespoke tours are offered weekly (except Mondays as Javett-UP is closed) for the Artology exhibition, curated by the University of Pretoria Museums. For all enquiries please contact Steven Motena at 012 420 2178, 012 420 5181, or museums@up.ac.za.
