24/04/2025
If you are in Berlin on Saturday 26 April, come to HKW from 6pm!
May 2025 marks 10 years since we staged an ethical exile from the Drill Hall, Joubert Park, Johannesburg, a state-owned, city-neglected site of memory that was renovated with a budget of circa R10 million, and then practically left to deteriorate. Our exile was motivated by operational health and safety - the lack thereof - as the primary beneficiaries and creators of our work were children of the inner city of Johannesburg and beyond.
Built circa 1904, serving largely as a colonial military barrack, the Drill Hall was a host of the 1956 Treason Trial of South Africa during apartheid. Abandoned in the mid-80´s, it served as refuge for homeless people, until two tragic fires in 2000 and 2001 woke the city up to either demolish the site, or declare it a site of memory, and a site for the community. Thus, it was re-opened in 2004 freshly renovated, only to be abandoned. Keleketla! Library entered the site in 2008, taking over from, and inheriting the bureaucratic struggle with the municipality from the Joubert Park Project, for the upkeep, maintenance, care and accountability of the city. This means that Keleketla!, founded and run by then students and young activists, simultaneously ‘opened the doors of education and culture’ for the community while mobilizing the city administration to account, with no success.
Nonetheless, beauty prevailed! This exile in 2015, therefore, was traumatic. Nonetheless, as custodians of the work created between 2008 and 2015 at the Drill Hall, we are humbled to present this document on behalf of all creators.
This document, 69 Years to the Treason Trial: The Drill Hall Arts Advocacy Project, is as much a letter of rage to the City of Johannesburg, as it is an endearing tribute to all the creators, the true recipients.
90% of the work herein was made at the Drill Hall, between 2008 and 2015. 95% of the work has never been made public.
Who made this work? See next post.
