Ralph Ziman

Ralph ziman

BIO

Ralph Ziman’s practice is motivated by a sense of social responsibility toward global politics. Using imagery that is at once vivid and dark, he comments on serious issues such as life under apartheid, the arms trade and trophy hunting. His work extends across a variety of media, including film, photography, public intervention, sculpture, and installation.

Recently, the artist has turned to salvaging and manipulating historical materials related to pan-African history in order to bear upon global politics. Drawing from his experience growing up in apartheid South Africa, Ziman’s work interrogates human rights issues such as apartheid, the over-militarization of police, and state violence. The artist’s The Casspir Project (2016), presented in a group exhibition at the National Gallery in Cape Town, South Africa, is composed of a repurposed military vehicle known as the Casspir. Post-apartheid, Casspirs were decommissioned in South Africa, their hulls left to rust, a relic of the past better forgotten, that is except for the ones that were sold to the United States during the Iraq war years, and later, to local police forces.

Ziman’s Casspir, entitled SPOEK 1, is covered in elaborate, brightly-colored panels of glass beadwork made in traditional patterns and completed by artisans from Zimbabwe and the Mpumalanga province of South Africa. In the age of Ferguson and Black Lives Matter, the Casspir has returned as a poltergeist from the past that continues to haunt us in the present. Ziman’s recent sculpture and installation work challenges the viewer to confront how cultural memory, often entangled in violence, may bear upon the contemporary.

After showing in Capetown, SPOEK 1 was exhibited at venues throughout Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2017, including The Turbine Art Fair and The Melrose Gallery. In 2018, the Casspir arrived in the United States where it was the Special Projects selection at 1-54, the Contemporary African Art Fair, in New York. It remained on view at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, New York, throughout the summer of 2018. In February 2019, The Casspir Project made its West Coast debut at an exhibition hosted by The Rendon Gallery in Los Angeles, California. In December 2019, SPOEK 1 was displayed at the entrance to PULSE Art Fair in Miami, Florida. Related pieces from The Casspir Project, including Ziman’s photography, film, sculpture, and installation work were exhibited inside the fair.

Prior to his work as a visual artist, Ziman’s early film Hearts and Minds (1995) gained international attention as the first independent South African feature film to be completed after apartheid, premiering at the Berlin and Montreal International Film Festivals. His film Jerusalema reached critical acclaim as South Africa’s entry to the 2008 Academy Award Foreign Language section.

CV

Ralph Ziman was born in 1963 in Johannesburg, South Africa, and currently lives and works in Los Angeles, California. His work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at The Rendon Gallery in Los Angeles; Joseph Gross Gallery in Tucson, Arizona; and C.A.V.E. Gallery in Venice, California, as well as group exhibitions at the National Gallery in Cape Town, South Africa; Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts in Brooklyn, NY; the FNB Art Fair in Johannesburg, South Africa; MUDAC in Lausanne, France; and Forum Schlossplatz in Aarau, Switzerland, among others.

EXHIBITION

taswira | seattle art fair 2024

july 25 - 28

solo show: the casspir project

seattle tour 2024

august 1 - 25

Collaboration with RAILSPUR GALLERY & TASWIRA

RALPH ZIMAN’S THE CASSPIR PROJECT TOURS SEATTLE | JULY - AUGUST, 2024

(Seattle, Washington) Ralph Ziman’s expansive series The Casspir Project will be touring the Seattle area for several exhibitions and activations aimed at social and educational engagement. Portrayed through photography, sculpture, film and installation, The Casspir Project reclaims and repurposes imagery and objects of apartheid, transforming symbols of oppression into icons of peace. This marks the first time the project will be presented in the Pacific Northwest.

THE VEHICLE | SPOEK 1

The central element of the project is the restored and refitted 11-ton, 22-foot-long apartheid-era Casspir police vehicle, its surfaces fully covered in 70 million brightly-colored, traditional patterns of handwoven glass beadwork, completed by artisans from Zimbabwe and the Mpumalanga province of South Africa, including women of the Ndebele tribe, known for their craftsmanship.

PHOTOGRAPHY | CASSPIR, THE AK-47 PROJECT

Two complete photographic series, Casspir, and The AK-47 Project introduce highly saturated and immersively detailed environments of allegory and aesthetic realism charting the history of institutional oppression caused by the South African military vehicle SPOEK 1 and the legacy of the global arms trade and its effects on the everyday lives of Africans and their relationship with the AK-47.

SCULPTURE | AK-47s, BONES, POSTAL BIKE, BEADED PANELS, KNITTED REGALIA

Besides the SPOEK 1, several other works of sculpture will be exhibited: The wire and bead woven Ak-47 sculpture used in The Ak-47 Project photography, a postal bike similarly adored in beads, the Bones series featuring replicated bones from African animals adorned in intricate beadwork, largescale beaded panels and knitted regalia shown on the soldiers riding the Spoek 1 in the Casspir photography.

THE CASSPIR PROJECT DOCUMENTARY

This 25-minute documentary on The Casspir Project includes historical footage introducing SPOEK 1 and its oppressive uses, as well as personal interviews with South Africans about their experiences during apartheid. The film shows the process of Ziman working with South African artisans on beading the massive vehicle that had come to represent a terrifying time in South African history, revealing the positive emotional impact of transforming an object of fear into an object of beauty.

Ralph ziman

Bio

CV

exhibition

BIO

CV

EXHIBITION