Introduction

The Johannesburg Biennale stands as a significant moment in both South Africa's cultural history and the global contemporary art landscape. Emerging in 1995, shortly after the end of apartheid and the country's transition to democracy, the Biennale represented South Africa's reentry into the international cultural arena after decades of cultural isolation and boycotts.

Despite only lasting for two editions (1995 and 1997), the Johannesburg Biennale had a profound impact on reshaping perspectives on global art, challenging Eurocentric narratives, and creating a platform for dialogue between the Global South and North. It introduced innovative curatorial approaches that would influence biennials worldwide in subsequent decades.

The Biennale's cancellation after its second edition in 1997 due to funding challenges and shifting political priorities left a complex legacy. Nevertheless, its brief existence marked a pivotal moment in the decolonization of global art discourse and remains influential in discussions about art, politics, and representation in post-colonial contexts.

First Edition: Africus (1995)

The inaugural Johannesburg Biennale, titled "Africus," ran from February 28 to April 30, 1995. It coincided with South Africa's first anniversary of democracy and was conceptualized as a celebration of the country's reintegration into the global cultural sphere. The Biennale featured 63 national pavilions and 20 South African exhibitions, organized under the primary curatorship of Lorna Ferguson.

The first edition's curatorial themes—"Decolonising our Minds" and "Volatile Alliances"—directly addressed the challenges of cultural re-entry after isolation, exploring how to avoid cultural recolonization while engaging with global artistic practices. This tension between local and global perspectives created a dynamic dialogue that would become central to the Biennale's identity.

The exhibitions were spread across various venues in Johannesburg, transforming the city itself into an expansive gallery. Highlights included innovative approaches to national representation, such as the Spanish Pavilion's "Black Looks White Myths," which featured 19 South African artists alongside only 4 Spanish artists, inverting traditional expectations of national pavilions.

While celebrated for its cultural ambition, the first Biennale also revealed tensions within South Africa's art community, particularly regarding representation and the disproportionate prominence of white artists in an event meant to showcase the newly democratic nation's diversity.

Second Edition: Trade Routes (1997)

The second and final Johannesburg Biennale, "Trade Routes: History and Geography," opened on October 10, 1997. This edition was curated by Nigerian-born, New York-based curator Okwui Enwezor, whose appointment signaled a radical shift in approach from the first Biennale's structure.

Enwezor's vision was to "look beyond the givens of history," challenging prevalent concepts like multiculturalism, postcolonialism, and globalization as potentially reproducing neo-colonial relations. The exhibition explored "how economic imperatives of the last five hundred years have produced resilient cultural fusions and disjunctions" and positioned South Africa's history as a point of commerce and exchange within a broader global framework.

Breaking with the traditional national pavilion format that had defined biennials up to that point, Enwezor enlisted an international team of curators—Gerardo Mosquera (Cuba), Kellie Jones (USA), Hou Hanru (Hong Kong), Yu Yeon Kim (South Korea), and Colin Richards (South Africa)—to organize exhibitions across Johannesburg and Cape Town. This innovative structure would later influence numerous international exhibitions.

Despite international acclaim, with Art Forum describing it as potentially "the most important exhibition of the 1990s," the second Biennale was controversial within South Africa. Critics argued that its conceptual, globally-oriented approach failed to engage with local communities and South African artistic traditions. These tensions, combined with funding challenges, led to the Biennale's early closure and ultimate discontinuation.

Legacy & Impact

Though short-lived, the Johannesburg Biennale had a lasting impact on global exhibition practice and art discourse, particularly through its second edition. Enwezor's curatorial approach—challenging Eurocentric perspectives, embracing a more fluid conception of geography and identity, and privileging artistic voices from the Global South—would inform his later work on documenta 11 (2002) and continue to influence curatorial practices worldwide.

The Biennale's innovative model of multiple curators working across diverse venues anticipated the increasingly distributed and collaborative nature of contemporary international exhibitions. Its critical engagement with globalization, migration, and postcolonial identity politics was ahead of its time and continues to resonate in contemporary artistic discourse.

For South Africa, the Biennale represented both promise and contradiction. Its discontinuation illustrated the challenges of sustaining international cultural platforms in contexts of socioeconomic transition and competing national priorities. Yet, the questions it raised about representation, cultural exchange, and the complex relationship between local and global art practices remain relevant to South Africa's contemporary art scene.

In recent years, there has been renewed scholarly interest in the Johannesburg Biennale as an important case study in the evolution of global exhibition practices and the decolonization of art discourse. Its legacy continues to inform conversations about the role of large-scale international exhibitions in contexts outside the traditional centers of the art world.

Key Figures

The Johannesburg Biennale was shaped by several prominent figures in the international and South African art worlds, whose visions and tensions helped define the character of this short-lived but influential event:

Okwui Enwezor

Nigerian-born curator who directed the second Biennale with an innovative approach that challenged traditional biennial structures and Eurocentric perspectives.

Lorna Ferguson

Primary curator of the first edition, who previously directed the Tatham Art Gallery in Pietermaritzburg and developed the initial themes.

Christopher Till

Director of the Biennale Project and Director for Culture for the Transitional Municipal Council of Johannesburg during the first edition.

Bongi Dhlomo-Mautloa

Responsible for 'Community Projects' and 'Outreach and Development' during the first Biennale, and later director of AICA: Africus Institute for Contemporary Art.