Ruth Simbao
Biographic Data
| ID | 1265864 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Ruth Simbao |
| GIVEN NAMES | Ruth |
| FAMILY NAME | Simbao |
| SIGNATURE | SIMBAO R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Rhodes University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9640-7491 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 53 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 21 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2005 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Between Land and a Raised Foot
A close connection between the earth and our feet can be deeply spiritual, powerfully transformational, and potentially subversive. In 2017, I developed the phrase, “between land and a raised foot” that explores the transitional space between a poised foot and the earth beneath it. I draw from the psychoanalytic notion of potential space, Buddhist practices of walking meditation, and African practices of associating land with ancestral spirits. I…
Moving Graves, Rousing Spirits
A trickster also known as “Jozi”
Visualising China in Southern Africa
From the dilemma of Chinese nation branding and soft power to the performativity of creative power
In this article I analyse the TAZARA Memorial Park in Zambia, which opened in 2022 and commemorates the Zambians, Tanzanians and Chinese who died while building the TAZARA Railway in the mid-twentieth century. Although the memorial is on Zambian soil and recalls a trinational history, it is largely driven by China as a form of Chinese nation branding and soft power. ‘International friendship’ typical of historic Afro-Asian solidarity permeates th…
A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education
May 03 2021 A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education: The Rise of blaxTARLINES Kumasi Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu, Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu kwaku boafo kissiedu (castro) is a cofounder and the administrative director of blaxTARLINES, Kumasi. He is a senior lecturer at the famed Fine Art Department of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana where, together with other colleagues, he has pioneered revolutionary changes in fine art ped…
Knowing With”
Rhodes University (or UCKAR),1 based in Makhanda, South Africa, joined the African Arts editorial consortium in 2016 and its first journal issue—vol. 50, no. 2—was published in 2017. Initially the board was run by Ruth Simbao, with the aim of developing collaborations with other scholars, particularly those based on the African continent and within the global south (Simbao 2017: 1).2 For the second Rhodes issue (Summer 2018), Simbao worked with G…
David Nthubu Koloane (1938–2019)
Dr David Nthubu Koloane (Fig. 1) was born in South Africa in 1938 and passed away on June 30, 2019, shortly after the opening of his retrospective exhibition, A Resilient Visionary: Poetic Expressions of David Koloane1 (Fig. 2). Koloane was an extraordinary pioneer in the visual arts who fiercely defied any form of categorisation. As an artist, teacher, mentor, curator, arts administrator, and published author, he fought for the human right to de…
Condition Report 3
all photos by Ruth Simbao except where otherwise notedRuth Simbao: Following on from the African Arts dialogue, “Zimbabwe Mobilizes: ICAC's Shift from Coup de Grăce to Cultural Coup” (Simbao et al. 2017) this dialogue considers another important event in the visual arts that recently took place on the African continent. Like the International Conference on African Cultures (ICAC) that was held in Harare in 2017, this event in Dakar contributes in…
Zimbabwe Mobilizes
The International Conference on African Cultures (ICAC) was held at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare from September 11–13, 2017. Eight delegates write their reflections on the importance of this Africa-based event.Ruth Simbao: Significant events took place in the study of the arts of Africa in 2017, registering a valuable geopolitical shift of the center of gravity in terms of knowledge creation. The Arts Council of the African Studies …
Situating Africa
Reaching Sideways, Writing Our Ways
Ruth Simbao: In Rehema Chachage's video installation, Kwa Baba Rithi Undugu (2010), sculptural objects representing old-fashioned transistor radios are mounted on the wall, side by side (Fig. 1). Embedded in each radio is a small video screen, which reveals a figure who stands in one place while the vertical line of the radio tuner crosses her body in search of the desired frequency (Figs. 2–3). A man's voice wafts in and out as it is periodicall…
Infecting the City
This article proposes the term 'site-situational' art or performance as a meaningful shift beyond 'site-specificity' and as a way to develop forward-moving and relational understandings of place. While place falls prey to Western, modernist stereotypes of closed, territorial geographic systems, site-situational readings, radical forms of 'recognition' and ambulatory hermeneutics enable an understanding of place as a wandering signifier, a trickst…
Cosmological Efficacy and the Politics of Sacred Place
Rise and fall of apartheid
The exhibition catalogue Rise and Fall of Apartheid is a valuable collection of photographic images that create, according to Enwezor, “a critical visualization and interrogation of [...] [apartheid’...
The Art of Change
There have been almost two decades of democracy in South Africa, yet rising anger and violent discontent lay bare continuing inequity. It is timely to ask the question: can South Africans really be
Walking The Other Side
While certain forms of mobility are romanticized in the privileged worlds of art and academia, the need to move is often triggered by vulnerability, and literal pathways on the ground reveal much about human engagement with place. This article considers the work of Mauritian-born architect/artist/performer Doung Anwar Jahangeer who is based in Durban, South Africa. Inspired by Michel de Certeau, Jahangeer argues that pathways reveal the character…
China-Africa Relations
About to board a plane in Johannesburg, I handed my temporary boarding pass to the flight attendant who exclaimed, “Simbao, you have a fong kong boarding pass!” Fong kong is a slang term used in South Africa meaning fake, cheap, or low quality and is often associated with Chinese imports. In this case, the term was used to refer to a temporary pass issued earlier on my journey that needed to be replaced with a new boarding pass in Johannesburg. I…
Dialectics of Dance and Dress
September 01 2010 Dialectics of Dance and Dress: The Performative Negotiation of Soli Girl Initiates (Moye) in Zambia Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. [email protected] Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rho…
The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings
June 01 2007 The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings: Reading the Shadow in Sam Nzima's Iconic Photograph of Hector Pieterson Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao teaches African Art History and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. Her current research interests are Zambian cultural festivals, heritage in relation to performance, and contemporary art in South Africa and Zambia. [email protected] Sear…
A Crown on the Move
Lechwe Trust Collection
The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings
June 01 2007 The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings: Reading the Shadow in Sam Nzima's Iconic Photograph of Hector Pieterson Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao teaches African Art History and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. Her current research interests are Zambian cultural festivals, heritage in relation to performance, and contemporary art in South Africa and Zambia. [email protected] Sear…
Situating Africa
China-Africa Relations
About to board a plane in Johannesburg, I handed my temporary boarding pass to the flight attendant who exclaimed, “Simbao, you have a fong kong boarding pass!” Fong kong is a slang term used in South Africa meaning fake, cheap, or low quality and is often associated with Chinese imports. In this case, the term was used to refer to a temporary pass issued earlier on my journey that needed to be replaced with a new boarding pass in Johannesburg. I…
Reaching Sideways, Writing Our Ways
Ruth Simbao: In Rehema Chachage's video installation, Kwa Baba Rithi Undugu (2010), sculptural objects representing old-fashioned transistor radios are mounted on the wall, side by side (Fig. 1). Embedded in each radio is a small video screen, which reveals a figure who stands in one place while the vertical line of the radio tuner crosses her body in search of the desired frequency (Figs. 2–3). A man's voice wafts in and out as it is periodicall…
The Art of Change
There have been almost two decades of democracy in South Africa, yet rising anger and violent discontent lay bare continuing inequity. It is timely to ask the question: can South Africans really be
Zimbabwe Mobilizes
The International Conference on African Cultures (ICAC) was held at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare from September 11–13, 2017. Eight delegates write their reflections on the importance of this Africa-based event.Ruth Simbao: Significant events took place in the study of the arts of Africa in 2017, registering a valuable geopolitical shift of the center of gravity in terms of knowledge creation. The Arts Council of the African Studies …
A Crown on the Move
Infecting the City
This article proposes the term 'site-situational' art or performance as a meaningful shift beyond 'site-specificity' and as a way to develop forward-moving and relational understandings of place. While place falls prey to Western, modernist stereotypes of closed, territorial geographic systems, site-situational readings, radical forms of 'recognition' and ambulatory hermeneutics enable an understanding of place as a wandering signifier, a trickst…
From the dilemma of Chinese nation branding and soft power to the performativity of creative power
In this article I analyse the TAZARA Memorial Park in Zambia, which opened in 2022 and commemorates the Zambians, Tanzanians and Chinese who died while building the TAZARA Railway in the mid-twentieth century. Although the memorial is on Zambian soil and recalls a trinational history, it is largely driven by China as a form of Chinese nation branding and soft power. ‘International friendship’ typical of historic Afro-Asian solidarity permeates th…
A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education
May 03 2021 A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education: The Rise of blaxTARLINES Kumasi Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu, Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu kwaku boafo kissiedu (castro) is a cofounder and the administrative director of blaxTARLINES, Kumasi. He is a senior lecturer at the famed Fine Art Department of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana where, together with other colleagues, he has pioneered revolutionary changes in fine art ped…
Knowing With”
Rhodes University (or UCKAR),1 based in Makhanda, South Africa, joined the African Arts editorial consortium in 2016 and its first journal issue—vol. 50, no. 2—was published in 2017. Initially the board was run by Ruth Simbao, with the aim of developing collaborations with other scholars, particularly those based on the African continent and within the global south (Simbao 2017: 1).2 For the second Rhodes issue (Summer 2018), Simbao worked with G…
Rise and fall of apartheid
The exhibition catalogue Rise and Fall of Apartheid is a valuable collection of photographic images that create, according to Enwezor, “a critical visualization and interrogation of [...] [apartheid’...
Dialectics of Dance and Dress
September 01 2010 Dialectics of Dance and Dress: The Performative Negotiation of Soli Girl Initiates (Moye) in Zambia Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. [email protected] Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rho…
Lechwe Trust Collection
A Crown on the Move
The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings
June 01 2007 The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings: Reading the Shadow in Sam Nzima's Iconic Photograph of Hector Pieterson Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao Ruth Kerkham Simbao teaches African Art History and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. Her current research interests are Zambian cultural festivals, heritage in relation to performance, and contemporary art in South Africa and Zambia. [email protected] Sear…
Dialectics of Dance and Dress
September 01 2010 Dialectics of Dance and Dress: The Performative Negotiation of Soli Girl Initiates (Moye) in Zambia Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rhodes University, South Africa. [email protected] Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Ruth Simbao Ruth Simbao is Associate Professor of African Art and Visual Culture at Rho…
China-Africa Relations
About to board a plane in Johannesburg, I handed my temporary boarding pass to the flight attendant who exclaimed, “Simbao, you have a fong kong boarding pass!” Fong kong is a slang term used in South Africa meaning fake, cheap, or low quality and is often associated with Chinese imports. In this case, the term was used to refer to a temporary pass issued earlier on my journey that needed to be replaced with a new boarding pass in Johannesburg. I…
The Art of Change
There have been almost two decades of democracy in South Africa, yet rising anger and violent discontent lay bare continuing inequity. It is timely to ask the question: can South Africans really be
Walking The Other Side
While certain forms of mobility are romanticized in the privileged worlds of art and academia, the need to move is often triggered by vulnerability, and literal pathways on the ground reveal much about human engagement with place. This article considers the work of Mauritian-born architect/artist/performer Doung Anwar Jahangeer who is based in Durban, South Africa. Inspired by Michel de Certeau, Jahangeer argues that pathways reveal the character…
Cosmological Efficacy and the Politics of Sacred Place
Rise and fall of apartheid
The exhibition catalogue Rise and Fall of Apartheid is a valuable collection of photographic images that create, according to Enwezor, “a critical visualization and interrogation of [...] [apartheid’...
Infecting the City
This article proposes the term 'site-situational' art or performance as a meaningful shift beyond 'site-specificity' and as a way to develop forward-moving and relational understandings of place. While place falls prey to Western, modernist stereotypes of closed, territorial geographic systems, site-situational readings, radical forms of 'recognition' and ambulatory hermeneutics enable an understanding of place as a wandering signifier, a trickst…
Situating Africa
Reaching Sideways, Writing Our Ways
Ruth Simbao: In Rehema Chachage's video installation, Kwa Baba Rithi Undugu (2010), sculptural objects representing old-fashioned transistor radios are mounted on the wall, side by side (Fig. 1). Embedded in each radio is a small video screen, which reveals a figure who stands in one place while the vertical line of the radio tuner crosses her body in search of the desired frequency (Figs. 2–3). A man's voice wafts in and out as it is periodicall…
Zimbabwe Mobilizes
The International Conference on African Cultures (ICAC) was held at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare from September 11–13, 2017. Eight delegates write their reflections on the importance of this Africa-based event.Ruth Simbao: Significant events took place in the study of the arts of Africa in 2017, registering a valuable geopolitical shift of the center of gravity in terms of knowledge creation. The Arts Council of the African Studies …
Condition Report 3
all photos by Ruth Simbao except where otherwise notedRuth Simbao: Following on from the African Arts dialogue, “Zimbabwe Mobilizes: ICAC's Shift from Coup de Grăce to Cultural Coup” (Simbao et al. 2017) this dialogue considers another important event in the visual arts that recently took place on the African continent. Like the International Conference on African Cultures (ICAC) that was held in Harare in 2017, this event in Dakar contributes in…
Knowing With”
Rhodes University (or UCKAR),1 based in Makhanda, South Africa, joined the African Arts editorial consortium in 2016 and its first journal issue—vol. 50, no. 2—was published in 2017. Initially the board was run by Ruth Simbao, with the aim of developing collaborations with other scholars, particularly those based on the African continent and within the global south (Simbao 2017: 1).2 For the second Rhodes issue (Summer 2018), Simbao worked with G…
David Nthubu Koloane (1938–2019)
Dr David Nthubu Koloane (Fig. 1) was born in South Africa in 1938 and passed away on June 30, 2019, shortly after the opening of his retrospective exhibition, A Resilient Visionary: Poetic Expressions of David Koloane1 (Fig. 2). Koloane was an extraordinary pioneer in the visual arts who fiercely defied any form of categorisation. As an artist, teacher, mentor, curator, arts administrator, and published author, he fought for the human right to de…
A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education
May 03 2021 A Quiet Revolution in Arts Education: The Rise of blaxTARLINES Kumasi Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu, Kwaku Boafo Kissiedu kwaku boafo kissiedu (castro) is a cofounder and the administrative director of blaxTARLINES, Kumasi. He is a senior lecturer at the famed Fine Art Department of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana where, together with other colleagues, he has pioneered revolutionary changes in fine art ped…
Visualising China in Southern Africa
From the dilemma of Chinese nation branding and soft power to the performativity of creative power
In this article I analyse the TAZARA Memorial Park in Zambia, which opened in 2022 and commemorates the Zambians, Tanzanians and Chinese who died while building the TAZARA Railway in the mid-twentieth century. Although the memorial is on Zambian soil and recalls a trinational history, it is largely driven by China as a form of Chinese nation branding and soft power. ‘International friendship’ typical of historic Afro-Asian solidarity permeates th…
Moving Graves, Rousing Spirits
A trickster also known as “Jozi”
Between Land and a Raised Foot
A close connection between the earth and our feet can be deeply spiritual, powerfully transformational, and potentially subversive. In 2017, I developed the phrase, “between land and a raised foot” that explores the transitional space between a poised foot and the earth beneath it. I draw from the psychoanalytic notion of potential space, Buddhist practices of walking meditation, and African practices of associating land with ancestral spirits. I…
Art (17 works) · Sociology (12 works) · Visual arts (10 works) · History (9 works) · Law (8 works) · Political science (8 works) · African history and culture studies (7 works) · Aesthetics (6 works) · Art history (6 works) · Geography (6 works)