By Matthieu Maralack*

The ‘elephant’ in my title refers to a public art case that preceded an urban cultural policy development initiative in eThekwini in 2010. The incision of the elephant case is a lens through which the continued debate on urban cultural policy development in eThekweni is explored. The ‘elephant in the room’ – pun intended, is a metaphor purposefully flipped in the title in order to draw attention to the complexities of the proverbial ‘elephant’. Simultaneously, it positions the urban cultural policy development debate as a ‘room’, the size and shape of which is yet to be understood and appreciated.  

On the one hand, the ‘elephant’ here is a physical sculpture which has political symbolism within the context of eThekwini, but on the other hand is a symbol of creativity and its intersection with the built environment. As will be unpacked, this case too symbolizes and reflects the fragmented nature of the South African urban state in its workings and understandings of creativity and culture. The ‘Room in the Elephant’ is an account of this elephant sculpture and how it reveals cultural policy development as the ‘elephant in the room’ of South African urban governance discourse.

In 2010 South Africa was the first African country to host the FIFA World Cup. Coinciding with this opportunity was world-renowned visual artist and sculptor Andries Botha being commissioned by the City of Durban to produce an art installation at Warwick Junction. This area is the inner city’s main commuter hub. The art installation was envisioned to form part of the Warwick corridor development as outlined in the city’s Integrated Rapid Public Transport Network (IRPTN) project. Botha is renowned for his work with elephants around the world. One of Botha’s Belgian elephant sculptures is pictured alongside.  

Botha was two weeks away from completing the Warwick installation when John Mchunu, a branch leader of the African Nation Congress (ANC), arrived on site and confronted Botha with a demand for the work to stop. Mchunu’s argument, was that Botha was constructing a symbol that resembled the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) logo, given that the installation comprised of three elephants. Thus, began a lengthy court battle.

The question is, what is the significance of the elephants looking like the IFP logo and why was this the reaction of ANC branch leader John Mchunu? What was the lens through which Mchunu interpreted this artwork?  

The history held between the ANC and the IFP has been characterized by intolerance, hatred and violence. Considered the bloodiest political violence of the apartheid era, this war ironically took place over a four-year timeline post South Africa’s first non-racial elections in April 1994. The political tensions between the ANC and IFP are undoubtedly significant in understanding the political landscape in eThekwini and the KwaZulu-Natal province at large. Though tensions have not resulted in mass civil violence in the last twenty years, the dynamic continues to exist and affect interpretations of seemingly the most unassuming pieces of public art; the ‘elephant’ case is one such example. The court battle took six years to resolve. The resolution was that Botha would construct a fourth elephant to appease the political contestation arising from the artwork resembling the IFP logo, whilst simultaneously not losing the initial investment of public funds.

 Interestingly, the Botha case was leveraged by the eThekwini City Architects Division as a springboard that identified a need for an urban cultural policy development process to be initiated. The rationale for this strategy being that City Architects envisioned several opportunities to incorporate public artworks in the design and rollout of the IRPTN moving forward. In other words, they needed a policy to guide this process and prevent situations like that of the Botha case. 

After hiring consultants to research and draft a policy, the architects partnered with the Parks, Recreation and Culture Department because they realized during the drafting of the policy, that it was better for the designated culture department to take it forward as opposed to them. The cultural policy consultants hired by the architects, strongly advocated for the policy to take on a creative industries trajectory according to the sectors outlined in the UNESCO Framework for Cultural Statistics. 

Having accepted the responsibility to politically champion the cause of the policy as envisioned by the City Architects, the Parks, Recreation and Culture Department did not adequately communicate that they had another agenda for the policy. As it turns out, the department began a process of developing an urban cultural policy prior to the 2010 FIFA World Cup and the Botha case; they envisioned the architect’s work on a draft policy as but a contribution to their initial policy development process and not the work in and of itself. 

The reality is that the architects spent over two years working on a creative industries policy, thinking that they were writing the final policy, when what the culture department really had in mind for a cultural policy was a heritage orientated policy. The culture department were dealing with different interest groups wanting recognition in the form of heritage sites and monuments. These cases were politically charged, and the feeling was that the architects’ draft policy did not address these. Again, we see how the ANC/IFP history continues to permeate the urban governance realities in Durban today.

Guy Redman, the then Deputy Director for arts and culture in the metro, who was approached by the City Architects to champion their cause, left shortly after the architects submitted their completed draft to him. Word on the progress of this policy development initiative since Redman’s resignation is unknown.

This case highlights the contested nature of culture in South African urban spaces and reveals the fragmentation at play between municipal departments, both in how they relate to one another more broadly, as well as how they have differing views on culture and how it ought to be articulated in policy. 

Why was Botha’s artwork not identified as contentious prior to construction by the commissioning department? Was John Mchunu held to account for essentially undermining a commissioning process in an ANC run municipality? Why was no middle ground found between the City’s architecture department and its arts and culture department’s understandings of culture? And why did the culture department not overtly state how they viewed the architect’s cultural policy work on agreeing to champion their cause politically? These are some of the questions that give us a sense of the size and shape of the room in the ‘elephant’.

It is safe to conclude that urban cultural policy development remains Durban Metro’s ‘elephant in the room’. 

Matthieu Maralack*

Matt Maralack is a South African, but truly identifies as a global citizen. He is a BA (Hons) Music and Musicology graduate from Rhodes University and has completed an MA in Cultural Policy and Management from Wits University. He is passionate about culture but more particularly within urban policy development and governance discourse. In addition, he considers himself a fun uncle having worked in youth development spaces as a program director for a US based summer camp company for two years respectively. Along with being a musician, he loves having deep and meaningful conversations but hates inevitable stomach cramps from laughing too hard at witty puns. Matt serves as Global Programs Associate at the African Leadership Academy in Johannesburg.