2008 The African Art Centre, Durban 2002 Greatmore Studios, Cape Town 2001 Puddled Sand and Red Ashes, Monash University Faculty Gallery, Australia 1999 Curwen Gallery, London 1996 New Academy Gallery, London 1994 New Academy Gallery, London 1991 Galerie Trapez, Berlin 1990 Gallery 21, Johannesburg 1990 198 Gallery, London 1985 Africa Centre, Stockholm
Selected Group Exhibitions
Lallitha Jawahirilal was part of a recent group exhibition at Michaelis Galleries
Other group exhibitions include:
2007 ‘Confluence’, Kalakriti Art Gallery, Hyderabad 2007 16th Anniversary Art Salon, Bangalore 2006 ‘Art Camp’, Renaissance Art Centre, Mumbai 2005 River Arts & Music Festival, Ladysmith, South Africa 2004 ‘Decade Of Democracy’, South African National Gallery, Cape Town 2003 ‘Journeys’, Ernest G. Welsh School of Art and Design, Atlanta 2001 ‘Jabulisa, The Art of KwaZulu Natal’, Durban Art Gallery, South Africa 2000 African Art Centre, Durban, South Africa 1999 Nico Malan Theatre, Cape Town 1998 ‘Kunst aus Südafrika’, Gallerie Seippel, Stuttgart, Germany 1998 Newcastle Museum, United Kingdom 1997 Trienalle, Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi 1996 ‘Conjures’, First Gallery, Johannesburg 1991 ‘Discerning Eye’,The Mall Galleries, London 1991 Barcelona International Biennale, Spain 1990 Contemporary Art Society, Art Market, Smith Gallery, London 1990 ‘Broadgate’, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London 1989 ‘Art London/89’, London 1987-8 Third International Bienniale Print Exhibition, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taiwan 1985 Mirror Reflecting Darkly: Black Women’s Art, Brixton Art Collective, London.
Mirror Reflecting Darkly: Black Women’s Art. 18 June – 6 July, Brixton Art Gallery, London. Unpag. (10 pp.) exhibiyion catalogue. Group exhibition of 16 Black women artists collective. Artists included: Brenda Patricia Agard, Zarina Bhimji, Jennifer Comrie, Novette Cummings, Valentina Emenyeoni, Carole Enahoro, Elisabeth Jackson, Lallitha Jawahirilal, Rita Keegan, Christine Luboga, Sue Macfarlane, Olusola Oyeleye, Betty Vaughan Richards, Enoyte Wanagho, and Paula Williams. 8vo, orange covers. Source: Brixton 50. Brixton Art Gallery Archive 1983-86
Choreographed and danced by Mamela Nyamza. Assistant director: Hannah Loewenthal
The performance celebrates the lives of, and commemorates, all women in sport, including Eudy Simelane, the Banyana Banyana soccer player who was stabbed 27 times because she was acting ‘like a man’. The work draws attention to the stryggle of women in sport and to girl children who experience discrimination in their own country, such as is currently the case with Caster Semenya. Mixed media link the drama and the dance, the 1960s and the present day, contextualizing the stories and serving as a bridge between different places, times and spaces, giving context to the idea that issues relating to sexuality necer take place in isolation.
Fifteen years after democracy, what are the gaps between anti-apartheid aspirations and present day realities? Hoe can the most progressive constitution in the world, which was worked our and earned through a historic liberation struggler in South Africa and which enshrines equality for people of all sexualities, be fulfilled in reality? It looks at private and public life, tradition and the law, the state and the individual, and at the struggle against apartheid and for sexual liberation.
The British Council funded Nyamza to create a piece about Eudy Simelane, Banyana Banyana star brutally murdered in 2008. apparently in response to her openly lesbian lifestyle. Initially, Nyamza struggles with the piece; ‘I got stuck because I felt like I had written the same work, about the two women. It was a simila thing. The others were shot and tied but this one was gang raped, stabbed and left in the field.’ ‘They said… she a “shero” in sports, a Banyana Banyana soccer player… While I was creating this work, when I was not actually creating, I was thinking about it the whole time. I was researching about her a lot, to a point where I thought, “It doesn’t take me somewhere I want to go.” Then there was a story about Caster Semenya… and I thought “Wow! Here’s the piece.” I realised I wasn’t going to talk about Eudy SImelane along {but] about women in sports.
‘So then I looked at women in sports in general; I looked at Zola Budd, back in the day; I looked at Caster Semenya. I even looked at wo,en overseas like the Williams sisters, Navratilova and the tennis; Eudy SImelane’s soccer, Banyana Banyana, and other women.’
With this change in direction, Nyamza’s imagination caught fire, leading to the creation of Shift. the work she performed at the Dance Umbrella. “Then is became personal. I went back – I was an athlete myself, at school; I was a sprinter… I used to be teased that I had legs like a boy’s, because I also used to do ballet, and then [my calf muscles] were really huge to a point where I was embarrassed to wear skirts. SO I saw the similarities, and then I thought the piece [would just show] my legs. SO I sis the piece in a white box – all white – with hanging balls.’ Nyamza begins the piece hanging suspended from a bar; this, along with the all white set, the presence of a fridge – which she ultimately climbs into, a cold coffin – are all symbolic of death, while several references to a kitchen also hark to the belief that women ‘must be cooking in the kitchen, [and] the fact that they’re killing women saying they they look so macho – those remarks about women in sports’. CreativeFeel (formerly ClassicFeel)
Becker, Natasha (2002) Inside and Outside the Family Album. Making, exhibiting and archiving the photograph in the South African National Gallery and the National Library of South Africa. Univerity of the Western Cape. Available here
One of the first things that reached me about photography was how a photograph tells a story or stories. This experience is perhaps most common when viewing personal photographs. A few years ago I was looking through a vast number of personal photographs, of a family I knew well, and was struck by how all the photographs (in albums, framed or lying loosely about) were part of a particular family narrative. Even without the storytelling, which accompanied my viewing of the photographs, I could still ‘read’ bits and pieces of the family history (and the broader social, political and cultural histories) in their photographs.
Journal articlesand essays
Becker, Natasha (2021) ‘In the Wake of Okwui Enwezor’. NKA: Journal for Contemporary African Art. Special Issue on Curator Okwui Enwezor. Available here
Becker, Natasha (2020) ‘To Imagine a Future World’. Curatorial Essay, exhibition catalogue, Present Passing, Osage Art Foundation, Hong Kong, China. March 2020. Book available here Becker, Natasha (2020) ‘Forever if Composed of Nows’ Curatorial Essay, exhibition catalogue ,A.I.R gallery, New York, NY. February 2020. Press release PDF
Becker, Natasha (2020) ‘Pushing Through a Public Memorial’. Guest Contributor, Brooklyn Rail Critics Page, New York, NY. February 2020. Available here Becker, Natasha (2019) ‘An Ode to Love’ Curatorial Essay, Ford Foundation Art Gallery, New York, NY. may 2019. Available here Becker, Natasha. 2015 ‘Encountering Virginia Chihota’ Exhibition catalogue essay, Tiwani Contemporary: Virginia Chihota. A Thorn In My Flesh (munzwa munyama yangu). October 2015. Available here
Becker, Natasha (2008) ‘Primitivism revisited: After the end of an idea’. African Arts, 41:1, 86-88. Available here [download pdf here]
Becker, Natasha (2001) ‘The “Lives of Colour” Exhibition. South African National Gallery, September 1999’ Kronos 27 Visual History, 270-291. Available here [download pdf here]
News Articles
Becker, Natasha (2021) Tschabalala Self with Natasha Becker. The Brooklyn Rail. March 2021. Available here
Becker, Natasha (2022) Gary Simmons with Natasha Becker. The Brooklyn Rail. May 2022. Available here
Becker, Natasha (2019) ‘Where Does My Heart Reside?’ Guest Contributor, Brooklyn Rail Critics Page, New York, NY. November 2019. Available here
Our workshops are open to everyone who is interested to learn about editing Wikipedia, our focus is on increasing the number of Wikipedia entries presenting women-of-colour artists from different fields of creative and cultural production. We are collaborating with experienced Wikipedia editors or representatives of Wikimedia South Africa to facilitate workshops and give recommendations about our work.
Participants will learn how to create and upload new articles or to expand existing entries. We will draw from research generated by the Art on our Mind research project and participants will work together creating and expanding Wikipedia entries on artists and creatives. To prepare, please identify an artist or artist group whose entry you want to create or expand. Please bring your laptop as we will work online, editing and creating entries.
Due to the current pandemic, all physical Wikipedia Workshops were moved online. We are currently collarborating with different institutions, training staff, creatives and the public:
We make use of a Wikimedia platform AOOM Wikipedia Workshops to coordinate our work, find more information here:
Past workshops
Wikipedia Workshop at Phototool Thursday, 5 March, 10-15h
The Wikipedia workshops at Phototool are run in collaboration with Art on our Mind, aiming to enable participants to upload new articles or to expand on existing entries. Phototool has been running a research project since 2016, entitled “Survey of Photography Training and Learning Initiatives on the African Continent” which plots a map of the photography training and learning initiatives that are currently operating in African coutries. In the workshop, we engaged with the research material which was generated by the project and participants learned how to generate references for Wikipedia entries. Participants also identified photographers/artists/creatives whose entry they helped to create or expand (individually or in group work).
African Feminisms (Afems ) Wikipedia panel discussion Saturday, 7 September 2019, 16h, Wits Graduate School Find out more about African Feminisms (Afems) or register here.
As Wikipedia enters the voting age this year, we will look a bit closer at the online encyclopedia’s accountability and in terms of its race, gender, sexuality and other bias, to inquire what programmes are in place to educate and decolonise this space of global knowledge collection. For this panel, Afems has invited Wikimedia South Africa director Bobby Shabangu and Wiki Loves Women co-founder Isla Haddow-Flood to speak about recent efforts of Wikimedia South Africa to change the way the online spaces frame what is “knowlege” who has access and who owns it.
Bobby Shabangu is Wikimedia ZA director of projects since 2013. His editing activities on Wikipedia focus on the African continent and the Joburgpedia project which involves several institutions. He organises workshops for Wikipedia training and is part of the Community Process Steering Committee for the Wikimedia Foundation working on formulating the 2030 Movement strategy.
Isla Haddow-Flood is a writer, editor and project strategist who is passionate about harnessing communication technology and media platforms for the advancement of open access to knowledge; specifically, knowledge that relates to and enhances the understanding of Africa via the Open Movement (and especially Wikipedia). Since 2011, Isla has been working with members of the WikiAfrica movement to conceptualise and instigate #OpenAfrica, Kumusha Bus and WikiEntrepreneur. She is the co-leader of projects such as Wiki Loves Africa (an annual photographic contest), Kumusha Takes Wiki (citizen journalists in Africa collecting freely-licensed content). In 2016, Isla has co-lead the NGO Wiki In Africa to instigate Wiki Loves Women (content liberation project related to African Women), WikiFundi (an offline editing environment that mimics Wikipedia) and WikiChallenge African Schools (that introduces the next generation of editors to Wikipedia). She also volunteers her time to the Wikimedia Movement’s strategy process by being a Working Group member for Advocacy and is a member of the Wikimedia Foundation’s Annual Plan Grant committee.
Wikipedia edit-a-thon Friday, 23 August 2019, 15h, Wits Writing Centre
Wikimedia Strategy 2030: Capacity Building and Diversity 2 August 2019, 15h, Wits Writing Centre
More than 20 participants came to engage in discussions during the Wikipedia Salon with Wikimedia ZA director Bobby Shabangu, focussing on two areas chosen by Wikimedia South Africa for the discussion of the Wikipedia 2030 strategy: Capacity Building and Diversity.
From the invite: Many people use Wikipedia as their first point of reference for their school research projects and general update on daily subject topics. The Wikimedia Foundation which runs Wikipedia would like to find out from you through a workshops which will be held in Johannesburg and Cape Town, how can they improve Wikipedia’s user interaction and how can they support content contribution so that it represent the diverse people who reads it, it’s a movement strategy which they aim to reach by year 2030 where Wikimedia content represents everyone who consumes and contributes to it. This will not be edit workshops but Salon Strategy where participants will discuss and take a short survey afterwards. So, we would like to invite you to take part in this Salon Strategy Survey. Over the next months Wikipedians around the world will be getting together to be part of this survey, so any ideas you have are very important to us. Come through! Even if you want to listen to how the conversation is going.
An Art on our Mind CREATIVE DIALOGUE with Senzeni Marasela. 26 April | 16.30h | 2018 Seminar Room | School of Fine Arts | Somerset Street Grahamstown, South Africa
Here (VR dance film installation, South Africa, 10mins) Presented at: Immersive Africa Exhibition – A Collection of 360° Narratives Works by work by Nyasha Kadandara, Shelley Barry and Nirma Madhoo. Isivivana Center in Khayelitsha, Cape Town. 10-13 December 2019 Curated by Electric South
Presented at: In Frame – A 360 Film Exhibition 23 November 2019-11 January 2020 TMRW Gallery, Rosebank
Second Creativate Digital Arts Festival at the National Arts Festival Makhanda, 27 June to 7 July 2019 National Arts Festival 2019 #1, #2, #3
2010
An Evening With Shelley Barry
28 April 2010, New York University, 19 University Place, 1st Fl theater. Room 102. Part of the disTHIS! Film Series, a project of the Disabilities Network of NYC in association with the New York University Council for the Study of Disability, a monthly showcase of festival quality independent and international short, documentary and feature films with disability themes audiences are unlikely to see elsewhere. Film director Shelley Barry @ NYU, Sean Jacobs, Africasacrountry
2007
Umbilical Cord (rehearsal documentation) Presented at: eVokability: The Walking Project 14, 15, 16 June 2007 Dance Theatre Workshop Studio 219 West 19th Street, NYC 10011
22 & 23 June 2007 Spirit Wind Studio 213 New St., Philadelphia, PA 19106
Selected Filmography
2019
Here (VR dance film installation, South Africa, 10mins) Premiere at theTogether! 2019 Disability Film Festival, 6-8 December 2019 The Old Town Hall Stratford Broadway London E15 4BQ, IMDB
2018
Re:incarnation (video poetry) A woman longs for her lover she has spent lifetimes with.
Out of Reach (video poetry) The city is out of reach for people with disabilities.
Ink/Visible A writer contemplates how writing counters invisibility.
2015
Keep in Touch
This fast paced, edgy music documentary celebrates the rise of Dope St Junde, a young, gender queer hip- hop star and all the challenges she faces in their quest for success.
Review: Staff writer (2015) Feminist Filmmaker Meets Boss Bitch Rapper. thejournalist 18 June 2015. Available online here.
2014
I’m Not Done Yet A tribute to artist, activist and writer, Charlene Maslamoney who succumbed to cancer in 2013. The 48-minute documentary celebrates Charlene’s work.
Reviews: Arts Writer (2015) Filmmaker Barry’s new work inspires hope. Cape Times 21 May 2015. Available online here. Cornelius, Jerome (2015) Film on activist’s cancer journey to touch patients’ lives. Times Live (7 August 2015). Available online here. Lewis, Desiree (2015) Gender, feminism and food studies. African Security Review, 24(4): 414-429. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10246029.2015.1090115 Available online here.
Diaries of a Dissident Poet (shortened documentary feature) Tracing the story of Dr James Matthews who used poetry to fight against the struggle and save his own life. Selected and sold out: Encounters Documentary Film Festival.
2013
Mr Shakes the Passion to Live (shortened documentary feature) A story of disco, cancer, tik. And Jesus. Selected and sold out: Encounters Documentary Film Festival
Where We Planted Trees The story of nostalgia for a house taken away during the group areas act in Port Elizabeth. Best Documentary: Diamond Screen film festival, Philadelphia
New York/New Brighton (short fiction) Two young girls across the oceans (Port Elizabeth and New York) dream of meeting Mandela and Yemaya.
2006
Cry Like the Loons (experimental documentary) A car accident transforms a holiday experience.
Str/oll (experimental documentary) A woman in a wheelchair explores the streets of Manhattan.
Umbilical Cord A revisioning of Frida Kahlo’s painting “What the water gave me”
2005
Retrato/Portrait (short fiction) Portraits from the life of a transwoman reflecting on her transition and her fractured relationship with her mother.
Inclinations (short fiction) Co-directed with Jen Simmons A writer faces blocks in writing and in love. Extensive screenings worldwide. Purchased by MTV in 2007 Selected as top 10 click list on MTV’s online film site.
Where are my Heels? (experimental documentary) A two year old girl in Puerto Rico takes over a party.
Pants? Skirt? Lipstick? Queer couples and their friends plot a night of fooling immigration for a green card, during the Presidency of George Bush. Selected for screening at The San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
2004
Whole: A Trinity of Being (experimental documentary) Three experimental shorts which deal with sexuality, visibility, and voice from the perspective of a wheelchair user who turns the camera on herself to celebrate love and survival. Including Pin Pricks, Voice/Over and Entry (Source: African Film Festival New York)
Best Film: Superfest: California Best Narrative Short: Philadelphia Festival of Independents Best Experimental Film: Breaking Barriers Festival: Moscow Best Experimental Film: Projections 2: Canada Spirit of Independence Award: Brooklyn (New York) International Disability Film Festival Jurors Citation Award: Black Maria Film Festival, New Jersey Outstanding Graduate Student Award, Pennsylvania Association of Graduate Schools Audre Lorde scholarship award for media production Television Acquisition: WYBE, DUTV (community tv stations USA) SABC, SA International festival screenings
Barry, Shelley (2013) Disability and desire: journey of a film-maker – life story. In: Ekine, Sokari (ed.) Queer African Reader. Nairobi, Dakar: Pambazuka Press.
Barry, Shelley (2011) The travelling poet. South Africa: British Council.
Barry, Shelley (2007) dipping inside elephantʼs eye. Presented at the 11th South African Womenʼs Arts Festival (SAWAF) 31 July – 12 August, The Playhouse, Durban.
Barry, Shelley, Deela Khan & Malika Ndlovu (eds.) (2003) Ink@ Boiling Point: A Selection of 21st Century Black Women’s Writing from the Southern Tip of Africa. Cape Town: WEAVE.
Barry, Shelley (2001) Strip. Surrender. Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity. African Feminisms One. No. 50, 128-130. [download pdf here]
Barry, Shelley (1999) ICU. In African Women’s Voices. PDF available here
Barry, Shelly (1998). Changing attitudes: an overview of awareness raising about disability in South Africa. Media Officer, Office on the Status of Disabled Persons, The Presidency, The Republic of South Africa. Published in 2001 as: Changing attitudes: an overview of awareness raising about disability in South Africa. Disability World 9 [download pdf here].
University of Johannesburg (2023) UJ’s Dr Shelley Barry wins SAFTA for innovative film. University of Johannesbug. 20 October 2023. Available here
Nel, Brandon (2023) Bay woman bags Safta nomination. Herald LIVE. 16 August 2023. Available here
University of Johannesburg (2022) UJ filmmaker and academic wins Zonta prize at International Short Film Festival Oberhausen. University of Johannesbug. 12 May 2022. Available here
Manaleng, Palesa (2022) BARRY WINS ZONTA PRIZE FOR FEMALE FILMMAKER AT INTERNATIONAL SHORT FILM FESTIVAL. EWN. 15 May 2022. Available here
Passchier, Shmerah (2021) The Portfolio: Virtual-reality filmmaker Shelley Barry. Mail & Guardian 2 April 2021. Available online here [download pdf here]
Motsa, Sihle (2020) ‘Scars Should also be Crowned’: reflecting on Shelley Barry’s cinematic oeuvre. Africa South Art Initiative(ASAI). Available online here [dowload pdf here]
Staff Writer (2018) Paralysed by gangs. Fighting back with film. Beautiful News [download pdf here]
Staff Writer (2018) How Barry’s disability never stopped her from making wonderful films. TimesLive, 28 March 2018. Available online here [download pdf here]
O’Reilly, Athina (2018) Film industry honour for ex-PE women. The Herald, 27 March 2018. Available online here [download pdf here]
Staff Writer (2015) Cape Town’s fearless females. A look at six trailblazing Mother City ladies.Cape Town Magazine [download pdf here]
Staff Writer (2015) Feminist Filmmaker Meets Boss Bitch Rapper. The Journalist, 16 June 2015. Available online here [download pdf here]
Staff Writer (2015) Reader Profile – Scars, the body, survival…love for life. Rolling Inspiration. [download pdf here]
Against All Odds. Award winning film-maker Shelly Barry reaches remarkable heights. ENCA 21 August 2013. Watch here, or here.
Great Texts: Shelley Barry. GIPCA Projects 2010 (Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts, now ICA) at UCT, 14 October 2010.
Filmmaker Shelley Barry will speak about her experiences and experiments in making films from a wheelchair and screen extracts of several short films in different genres reflecting on her process of creativity and production: Extracts will include, among others, a trilogy – Whole-A Trinity of Being, a documentary recounting survival of one of South Africa’s lesser-known wars, namely the ‘taxi wars’; Inclinations – a writer struggles to write erotica and deal with her personal life; Where are my heels? – a tribute to the spirit of a young girl child and Str/oll – a wheelchair user navigates the streets of Manhattan. Find the content online: http://www.ica.uct.ac.za/GIPCA/projects/2010/GTBQSBarry
Listen to the presentation here:
Kgaboesele, Kitso (2006) Triumph. Shelley Barry – Trauma: Paralysed in a taxi shooting. Passion: Making real-life movies. Femina Issues 2517-2520.
You know that saying ‘When life gives you lemons, make lemonade?’ Look at what these three women made from their traumatic experiences
Fisher, Tyrone (2019) Creativate Digital Arts Festival: Something For The Insanely Curious. between 10 and 5 (online). Available online here [download pdf here]
Moonsamy, Nedine (2019) The poetic revolution will not be anthologized. africasacountry September 2010 (online). Available online here [download pdf here]
Kamaldien, Yazeed (2016) Cape poet urges universities to teach his work. Sunday Argus 27 March 2016. Available online here [download pdf here]
2015 Two Short Films by South African filmmaker Shelley Barry at the Firehouse this April. Manhattan Neighbourhood Network (online). Available online here [download pdf here]
Collison, Carl (2014) An ode to a dissident. Southern Suburbs Tatler, 12 June 2014 [download pdf here]
Jacobs, Sean (2010) Film director Shelley Barry @ NYU. africasacountry 28 April 2010 (online). Available online here [download pdf here]
Tsumele, Edward (2008) Wits Arts and Literature Experience, 3-6 April 2008. Sowetan Live 3 April 2008 (online). Available online here [download pdf here]
Willemse, Nicky (2007) Opposing worlds united on screen. Weekend Post (n.d.) [download pdf here]
