GENERATIONS Curator Announcement | Heba El Kayal

Heba El Kayal is a curator, writer and researcher from Cairo, Egypt. She gained a bachelor’s degree in English and Comparative Literature from the American University in Cairo, and a master’s degree in Modern Art History and Curatorial Studies from Columbia University in New York City. She has worked in various art-related capacities in Dubai, Beirut, New York, and London, amongst other cities, specializing in modern and contemporary art from the Middle East and North Africa. Over the course of her career, she has regularly consulted for auction houses and private collectors, working closely with both emerging and established artists from the region, and speaks regularly on topics related to the preservation of artist estates; modern and contemporary Middle Eastern and African art; and the importance of institutional cross-collaboration on the African continent. She served as Chief Curatorial Consultant at the Norval Foundation between 2023-2024, and is currently finishing an LLM in Legal Studies from the UK.

 

As part of the Investec Cape Town Art Fair's 2024 Talks Programme, Heba moderated "Curatorial Chronicles" with speakers Bernardo Follini, Wim Pijibes, Raphael Chikukwa and Khwezi Gule.

 

 

 

GENERATIONS celebrates artists at different career stages and instigates cross-generational conversations among them. Two selected galleries will share a 48 SQM booth, each showcasing one artist from a specific generation in a 24 SQM booth. Galleries are encouraged to propose a renowned, established artist, or a contemporary equivalent, for consideration. Galleries can also propose their own pairings.

 

The section prioritises the necessity for artists to convene and collaborate across time and space, with awareness, respect, and camaraderie. We welcome artists who are known for disrupting traditional ideas and engaging with communities, places, or the world around them using fresh and relevant practices.

 

If play is the language of children, innate and expressed with such fluency, how do we lose fluency as adults, and with it, a means by which to fluidly and light heatedly engage with the world ?

To play is to do more than the act itself, but to make sense of the world. To play is to act, dance, dream and cry; to process the highs and lows of every day life. The question then becomes what happens to those who forget how to play? And what happens to those who persist in continuing to play? Is to play a childish act, or is it an act of defiance, courage and hope?

Most importantly, the question of why we play and why we should play is a question grounded in this selection of works. We play to remember, we play to forget, we play to understand, we play to protest, we play to assert ourselves in the world, and we play to understand our very selves.

Perhaps we do this first and foremost before attempting to take our place in the world, but we also do this with words, music, dance and art to understand the very complicated and difficult world we find ourselves in today. How can play help us to navigate difficulties of our past and troubles of our present ? How can it help us move towards an uncertain future?

All these questions prompt the following discourse and various works selected for the Young Generation section. In playing with notions of play, both literal and abstract, I hope to bring the viewer back to an internal place that they were once perhaps well-acquainted with, and is now perhaps forgotten.

 

 

- One artist from your gallery, a renowned, established artist, or a contemporary equivalent.

- Two artists from your gallery in a cross-generational conversation.

- Two galleries with two artists, one artist from each gallery, in a cross-generational conversation.

 

The section prioritises the necessity for artists to convene and collaborate across time and space, with awareness, respect, and camaraderie. We welcome artists who are known for disrupting traditional ideas and engaging with communities, places, or the world around them using fresh and relevant practices.

 

To apply for GENERATIONS, click here.