黑料不打烊

obert contemporary is pleased to present `after a model` by mark hipper. based on small grainy images found in apartheid-era physical education syllabi from pretoria, hipper`s monochromatic oil on canvas work explores the impact and longevity of these educational materials and their value today. according to hipper, `these are paintings from small grainy images found in the physical education syllabus, senior book 2, printed in pretoria in 1952. what interests me about these faded and grainy images is that the exercises and activities represented in them echo across decades of educational models, repeated and reinforced right into the present day. the paintings are `copies`, as are the exercises which were to be performed as outlined and illustrated in this syllabus. all education, all culture and social coexistence are constructed out of a form of repetition: of conventions, ideas and attitudes. outside of the carefully formulated legal constructs defining copyright and the idea of the original, the authentic and the copy, all that we know - all ideas and ways of seeing the world - are in some form or another a repetition, a copy of a received idea. like bouvard and pecuchet in flaubert`s satirical novel, we still believe that `ideas themselves can triumph throughout the world`. the `life drawing class` of art schools anywhere in the world present students of art with a model, a model `of life` that is already an idea, a construct, an image of life, before the first line is put to paper.` hipper has exhibited widely in europe and south africa. `after a model` is his first solo exhibition in johannesburg.