Breath-taking Concrete Designs and Art to Visit Nelson Mandela University
The PPC Imaginarium Awards will conclude its 2018 tour with a visit to Nelson Mandela University (NMU) in Port Elizabeth. From 23 August – 12 September, visitors to the university’s Bird Street Gallery are invited to explore concrete masterpieces by a number of top local creatives chosen as finalists for South Africa’s most supportive art and design competition.
The official launch of the exhibition will be a gala event at the gallery on Wednesday 22 August, where invitees can view finalists across all categories of the PPC Imaginarium Awards, including film, fashion, sculpture, jewellery, architecture and industrial design. Invitees will include delegates from the NMU Dean of Arts’s annual conference dinner, which takes place on the same night, and so guests will be privy to a thrilling confluence of ideas, arts and creativity.
The annual travelling exhibition of the PPC Imaginarium Awards follows the crowning of its category winners and runners-up. The first stop was the University of Johannesburg (UJ) Art Gallery where the national judges chose the winners and runners-up; thereafter the works travelled to Cape Town to exhibit at the Association for Visual Arts (AVA) Gallery, to Newtown’s RMB Turbine Art Fair and 100% Design South Africa in Midrand.
In 2018, the PPC Imaginarium Awards named a record number of national finalists for the competition – 62, of which nine were declared winners and runners-up (excluding architecture).
Overall winner Chris Soal’s piece, “Imposed Structure (Deflated)”, speaks to the realities of growing up in a city environment, where soccer is played in the streets, on concrete and tar, and the relationship between soccer and the South African industrial sector. A design that conceived of a “public, connective architecture” for District Six won the prize for Architecture at the 2018 Architecture ZA (AZA) conference, conceptualised by University of Cape Town (UCT) student Roark Robinson. Both Soal’s and Robinson’s entries will be on show at the Bird Street Gallery at NMU.
“NMU is a fitting venue to be hosting the last stop of the travelling exhibition, which started at the University of Johannesburg,” says Daniel van der Merwe, Director of the PPC Imaginarium. “We are thrilled to see our finalists’ work on display in a collegial forum, where they can educate and inspire students in the visual arts.”
Details for the gala event:
Venue: Bird Street Gallery, 20 Bird Street, Central
Date: Wednesday 22 August 2018
Time: 18h00
