Covid-19, 2020: Gordon Froud

by Pam Allara

The first day of South Africa's The Lockdown Collection showcases a composite work by Gordon Froud,  integrating the new sculpture   Covid-19:2020 with the older drawing "View from August 3(2016).  Over the chalk and charcoal drawing of an empty Johannesburg cityscape, the novel coronavirus appears, as if floating in air.  The artist explains, in turn, the drawing and the sculpture: 

 "Although this was done for my Standard Bank gallery show Harmonia in 2018, it has even more relevance now. It depicts a view of Johannesburg from the rooftop of August House in New Doornfontein. As the focus was on the Geometry in the city, people were never part of the narrative. In the time of lockdown, the lack of people is definitely part of the narrative as we have been forced into isolation. This leaves the city as an eerie place. In the current context, this could be read as post lockdown or post virus when there are fewer people to inhabit the streets. The emptiness and loneliness of an unpeopled city seems strangely prophetic and somewhat poignant."

The artist has imposed over the drawing an imgage  of his new small "Covid 19 (2020)" sculpture, of which he writes, "The Covid 19 virus made as a sculpture from found objects. It speaks of the beauty of the structure."

One of South Africa’s most prominent artists, and certainly one of the most tireless, Gordon Froud inhabits many layers of the country’s artworlds. He has brought many emerging artists to public awareness through the numerous exhibits he has organized ever since he was a student at the University of the Witswatersrand in Johannesburg. Indeed, his own studio often serves as a gallery as well. In addition, he inspires new generations of sculpture students at the University of Johannesburg, where he teaches. And finally, his own sculpture--which has been exhibited everywhere but in the United States it seems-- has been based predominately on the structures of viruses and bacteria. How prescient his Conevirus series, made from road cones, seems now!

In contrast to those large, imposing sculptures, Covid 19: 2020 is delicate and unassuming: even amusing in its construction from a hockey ball, golf tees and push pins! But after our initial smile fades, we are left with an elegant object whose subject is danger. Things that please us may also seriously threaten us. Covid 19: 2020, although tiny, provides us with a lot to contemplate.

The beautiful charcoal and chalk drawing, "View from August 3 (2018)" is equally prescient. A view from the building that houses many artists’ studios in Johannesburg, August House, Froud eliminated the heavy automobile and pedestrian traffic in the area to concentrate on the geometric formations of the architecture. And unsettling as it is to see that image as an accurate representation of the city’s emptiness today, Froud’s comment that it may represent a post-virus city scene is even more discomforting.  In Albert Camus’ novel The Plague (1957), the entire city celebrates in the streets once the bubonic plague passes. Is it possible that we may not do the same?

--Pam Allara