"Inside: Looking In by Linda Jones"
2001-03-06 until 2001-03-25
NSA Gallery
Durban, , ZA South Africa

The looking inward as suggested by the title of this challenging exhibition by Linda Jones, are evident in photographic, video, sculptural objects and installations. At first glance images and objects guide the viewer into the most private of spaces: inside the body. This however is placed in a context where the artist investigates the innards of the body (repulsive and contaminated) in relation to domestic spaces (clean and safe).     

The artist states that the exhibition explores an inner space as well as an outer space. These images speak of a defining of my own space – a reclaiming and negotiation of space. Spaces that are visible and others that are somehow private and inaccessible.

A section of the exhibition comprises an installation where the artist recreates a middleclass lounge, complete with dirty-pink carpet, coffee tables and reproduction Victorian chairs covered in pink velour. Juxtaposed with this ensemble (symbolic of bourgeois values and taste) Jones places images on the wall and play a video with material that are uncomfortable and difficult to look at – the camera moving into orifices, bringing to light the unseen and unseemly, the ‘repulsive’ and hidden. 

Linda Jones recently completed her B. Tech degree (cum laude) at the Technikon Natal in Durban. 

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for South Africa

Other Important Exhibitions in South Africa