Ever wondered how come Lois Lane doesn’t recognise that her two love interests – Superman and Clarke Kent - are one and the same? Curator Joost Bosland has the answer: “In popular culture, the archetypal disguise is Superman’s pair of glasses, which turn him into Clark Kent. This particular case reveals something: often that which is disguised is hidden in plain view.” Or as writer William Burroughs puts it, disguise is not a false beard, dyed hair, and plastic surgery. Disguise is clothes and bearing and behaviour that leave no questions unanswered: “Nobody gets through my cover, I assure you. There is no better cover than a nuisance and a bore. When you see my cover you don't look further. You look the other way fast.”
It’s this complex space of disguise, allegory, opacity, saying and unsaying, the seen and the unseen that Bosland explores in his group show, Disguise. The exhibition, which marks the opening of the Michael Stevenson’s new premises in Woodstock and the gallery’s fifth birthday celebrations, is a suitably high profile affair including painting, sculpture, photography, and video by everyone from Candice Breitz, David Goldblatt, Youssef Nabil and Yinka Shonibare to Pieter Hugo, Zander Blom, Zanele Muholi, Athi-Patra Ruga and more. But don’t be deceived by its flashy “usual suspects” line up. If the preview pics are anything to go by, Disguise is set to be one of the sneakiest, subtlest, sexiest and freshest exhibitions of the year. Pieter Hugo teams up with a bunch of out of work Nollywood actors to create images that make photographer David LaChapelle’s sexy, surreal, candy-coloured constructions look vanilla; Zanele Muholi offers a provocative play on pageantry; Youssef Nabil presents veiled portraits and David Goldblatt extends Burrough’s stealth strategy in his stark black and white architectural investigations. And that’s just for starters.