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Ellies roam DurbanSIHLE MTHEMBU

THE streets of Durban’s CBD are hot, fullof cars and people and chunks of retailspace. At times, it can be claustrophobic.On the edge of a side walk on Anton Lem-bede Street (formerly known as SmithStreet) is a construction site. With cranesand large amounts of dust, the site is mostlyshielded from the public eye by a series ofwooden enclosures that surround thespace. The story here is not the site itselfbutaseriesofdrawingspastedonthewood-en constructions. Black and white in colour,and exaggerated in scale, these works arethe culmination of a year’s work in publicspaces of artist Mook Lion.

A Durban-born conceptual and streetartist, Lion has almost single-handedly tak-en it upon himself to revitalise the Durbanpublic art scene as well as the debatearoundit — amovethathasover thecourseof this year seen him install pasted postersall around the city.

And his work is getting attention. Askedwhat prompted him to do this, Lion says itwas a deep sense of frustration around thelack of direction for public art in Durban.“I was actually commissioned to do a jobforanon-governmentalorganisationwhichdidn’t work out. But I liked the images I hadcome up with and felt they would work wellas wheat-pasted posters,” he says.

“I felt thestronggraphicmarkswhichyouachieve from lino cutting (which is a tradi-tional fine-art technique) fits well in theharsh urban environment of the Durban in-ner city.”

Lion is not someone who is new to work-ing beyond the margins and creating workin public spaces. Last year, he and six mateswerearrested fordamagetopropertywhenthey were caught drawing a tribute to afriend on an abandoned wall. Although thecharges were later withdrawn, this experi-ence left a definite impression on Lion andis something that enhanced the Still Freeposters concept, for which Lion now has acult status.

“The Still Free concept comes from thetime when me and my friend Dok had mali-cious damage to property charges. We con-tinued to paint but were always grateful tostill have the freedom to do so.

“We were still free!”“It’s also about the fact that there are

many things in society which restrain peo-ple’s freedom, like poverty, lack of educa-tion, etc, but it’s also up to the individualto make things happen for themselves, re-gardless. It’s an attempt to encourage oth-ers to realise their own creative freedom.Especially within the public space, whichpeople need to engage with more.”

WhatmakesLion’sStillFreeposters sucha welcome addition to the Durban publicspace is that they are not self-consciouslyarty.Hisemploymentofasimplecolourpal-etteofblackandwhite,andoccasionallyredand blue, ensure that the drawings aremostly discreetly integrated into the spacethey occupy.

“It’s classic and effective. You can’t gowrong with that combination. But most im-portantly, it’s the cheapest way to makephotocopies,” he says with a smirk.

What makes Lion’s drawings all the moreappropriate is that they do not stand alone.They are a call to arms and an act of protestagainst thedeafeningsilence that ispresentaround policy for public art in Durban.

ForLion, the imageof thethreeelephantsthat he uses in his Still Free series is notrandom. It is aimed at in some way resur-recting the three covered and destroyed el-ephant installed not too long ago by AndriesBotha in the Warwick Market area.

“My work is most definitely a direct re-sponse to Andries Botha’s sculptural ele-phants in Warwick. ANC members claimedthat thosesculptural elephantswereasym-bol of the IFP, which they felt is unaccepta-ble in an ANC city, so they called the projectto a halt and have left them to deteriorate.I feel it is an example of politics interferingin my area of interest, public art in Durban,he says.

“It is also an example of the ANC’s abuse

of power, disregard for the law and thewasting of tax payer’s money. Also, the factthat elephants are beautiful animals whichwere in Durban way before the IFP or theANC.

“My idea was to place the image of threeelephants all over Durban as if they wereroamingfreely.Bydoingthis, Iaimedtodefythe authority’s attempts to remove the ele-phants from Durban. Also to raise aware-ness about the issue and attempt to createa dialogue around it.”

The installation on the side of this con-struction site was curated by Lion as partofhisuniversitycoursework.Here,heinvit-ed other students and upcoming artistsfrom Durban to make their contribution bysubmittingapieceofartunder theStill Freebanner.

This series stretches the borders of whatweregardasart. It is right there, in thepub-lic space, where people of all kinds of racesand class sensibilities are confronted by it.Whether you choose to ignore it or tear itup or take a picture of it, you are alwaysinteracting with it, in one way or another.This is something that Lion feels is funda-mentally important in ensuring that art be-comes part and parcel of our public spacesand is something we interact with daily.“Galleries cater for a certain group of peo-plewhomakeup theminorityofoursociety.If I want my work to have a positive impacton society then working in the public spaceis my only option,” says Lion

Seeing the Still Free exhibition adding vi-tality to such a dead space is a strong state-ment not only around the infinite value thatstreet art can add to urban regeneration,but also around the relationship communi-ties have with the art itself.

The exhibition is not only a unique prac-tice in creativity, it is also an exercise infaith. Lion has trusted the public to care forthese works as long as they can. It has beenalmost a month now and, with no guards,the drawings remain intact.

The Durban public is clearly paying backthe faith Lion has showed in them.

Lion’s elephants — a call to arms.

PHOTO: SUPPLIEDMook Lion: ‘My work is most definitely a direct response to Andries Botha’s sculptural elephants in Warwick.’

ART ATTACK: Mook Lion is pasting pachydermsaround the city in a unique protest.

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