Known for his engagement with urban landscapes in photography, performance, murals, and drawing, Robin Rhode’s work thrives in the public space. He has variously worked with the motif of the wall as both substitute canvas and metaphor for the segregation that marked South African urban spaces for decades. Trained in Fine Art at the Technikon Witwatersrand (now University of Johannesburg) and at the Association of Film and Dramatic Arts (AFDA), from 1996 to 2001, his practice has grown to include sculpture—two of which are shown in the context of Global Fascisms. Ghost Dog (2008) is a two-headed mongrel—vicious in demeanor and spiky in form, ready to attack. On approach, the spikes turn out to be many switchblade knives left in after a botched stabbing. In the annals of South African protest histories, dogs feature prominently as a common image of apartheid repression and policing, as were state-of-the-art helmets in the other sculptural work Impis I - XIII (2008). One is blue, and the other silver/white, and both are fitted with a protective screen that can alternatively be used as a visor—a sleekness that tips into the uncanny. Both works conjure surveillance and violent control in a specific context, but in an age of increased political repression, may be read as a global warning.

WORKS IN THE EXHIBITION: Ghost Dog (2008), bronze, 88 × 124 × 80 cm; Impis I - XIII (2008), 2 helmets of cast glass, plastic, steel. Courtesy of the artist