Doung Anwar Jahangeer

by SAarts Emerging Team (Bronwyn Lace, Nathaniel Stern, Simon Gush)

A kind of cultural chameleon of difficult-to-place origins, Doung’s ‘art-work’ is more like a long-term social project that asks us to look again at our preconceptions, stereo-types, and interpersonal relations. Obviously idealistic, a walk through Doung’s efforts is an invitation to believe; it may sound overly-sentimental, seem futile, or even appear condescending at points, but his optimism and faith in humanity are utterly infectious, and his project is more than a gesture towards empowerment: it works.

Doung’s international background and architectural training led him to explore structures and hierarchies, and how we “break” them every single day. His well-known “city-walks” begin by pointing out buildings and walkways that are built for use in one way, but wind up being transfigured by the world and community around them. From small amounts of grass that magically crack their way through manmade cement streets, to unused walkways surrounded by dirt paths beaten into what was intended as lawn space, Doung inevitably leads us to a “vision of questioning.”

Finally, he puts us in front of our own eyes by enabling us to see how we interact with those different from us. After a long day of seeing the world in a different light, we simply walk into people’s homes, and talk. This is not just a lesson in difference; it is one part of a larger project that empowers through art, reveals unseen realities, and makes tangible change on day-to-day lives, on all levels of class and race.

Doung’s work tends to be participatory and socially-charged performances / experiences, whose by-products are secondary to process. He contends that architecture routinely focuses on brick and mortar, forgetting the spaces they are meant to provide, and the negative spaces between. He calls this the ‘spaces of in-between,’ and says that they are much like the oft-forgotten people that inhabit them.

A prime example of Doung’s multi-faceted approach would be his work for Negotiate (Johannesburg Art Gallery, 2004). As a co-curator and an exhibiting artist on this exhibition, we oversaw Doung as he worked with a group of street children from the end of Paul Nell Street in Hillbrow. Dubbing them ‘Streetlights’ – ‘street kids’ has too many negative connotations – they mapped out a city-walk route, together, between the JAG and Constitutional Court. The route was not direct or efficient, but it more than served its purpose of performing and documenting the spaces between the two cultural centres.

Streetlights during a workshop at the Constitutional Court

For Negotiate, The Streetlights went on to collaborate with Doung in the creation of installations at the JAG and Constitutional Court. Asked to visually describe their relationship to the architectures of their surrounding spaces, they produced a provocative showing of objects from street-life, framed in the gallery space. They were involved in ongoing social programs and activities, culminating in a permanent-relationship-building workshop that took place at Constitutional Hill. Post-Negotiate, the ongoing Streetlight Initiative, facilitated by the Constitutional Hill, means we can expect to see more Doung/Streetlights workshops and programs in the future.

Doung and Streetlights installing at the Constitutional Court

Doung’s obvious intention is to give agency and empowerment through expression and belonging, simultaneously shedding light on life just outside The Gallery, The Hill, etc. We cannot express enough how amazing Doung is with both sides of this potentially volatile relationship. The lack of pretensions and condescension, the care-full interactions, only lead to the most honest and beneficial of relationships.

Streetlights during workshop at the Constitutional Court

Up & coming: Doung is in the process of working on another extension to the Streetlights Initiative, called Coming Home, that will likely take place later this year. He’s recently started a company (Doung²) to focus and refine his unique practice of bringing together art, architecture and activism.

Current: Doung is co-curating (with Guy-Andre Lagesse) the Mari-Mira: Playing with Life exhibition, which opens at the Johannesburg Art Gallery this Sunday, 19 March at 6:30pm. The show features a video documenting Doung’s City Walk and will feature a seminar, in conjunction with the Art in Public Spaces exhibition, on Monday 20 March, 6:30pm (also at JAG).

Next feature is 21 April: Our first guest writer, Lester Adams, does a piece on Hannes Olivier - a young, Johannesburg-based sculptor.