Ralph Ziman: ‘I hated apartheid. I hated what it did to people around me’

The white South African-born artist talks to Charlotte Cripps about his 11-ton apartheid-era vehicle and AK-47s adorned with traditional African beadwork, which are surprising exhibits at this week’s San Francisco Tribal and Textile Show

The artist Ralph Ziman is exhibiting an Apartheid-era Casspir vehicle covered in 70 million African beads at the San Francisco Tribal and Textile Art Show (Simone Niamani)

When we think of tribal art, it’s likely to be indigenous cultural artifacts such as wooden masks, dance regalia and sculptural forms. Not AK-47 assault rifles and an 11-ton war machine that have been transformed into symbols of beauty and peace with multi-coloured traditional African beadwork.

But at the popular San Francisco Tribal and Textile Art Show this week, the artist Ralph Ziman is exhibiting apartheid-era weapons from the Casspir Project (2016), a travelling multidisciplinary fine art exhibition that was recently on display in Miami, during Art Basel.

He created the project in response to apartheid’s effects on South African culture, a regime the white South African artist fled aged 19, when he dodged military service in 1981 and moved to LA.

There are no real guns involved; instead, the AK-47’s are merely bead and galvanised wire sculptures.

Ziman’s artworks including the AK-47s which are adorned in African beads explore themes of militarisation of the police, oppression, gun violence and inequality (The Casspir Project)

“The idea with these was to do a sort of reversal of the arms trade, make beautiful non-lethal weapons in Africa and export them to the world,” Ziman tells me.

The piece de resistance is his massive revamped, apartheid-era Casspir armoured vehicle and troop carrier that will form the centrepiece of this largest and most important tribal art show in the US at the Fort Mason Centre, where visitors will also be able to drop into the American Indian Art Show.

The vehicle, titled SPOEK 1 – which means ghost in Afrikaans, a nod to the friendly cartoon strip ghost Casper – is covered in 70 million brightly coloured panels of glass beadwork made in traditional patterns, in collaboration with artisans from Zimbabwe and the Mpumalanga province of South Africa, including women of the Ndebele tribe.

Ziman whose artworks explore themes of militarisation of the police, oppression, gun violence and inequality, was inspired to reclaim it as an artwork, not only because of its place in the history of apartheid, the system of segregation and institutionalised oppression in which he grew up, but because of its relevance to modern-day America.

“The vehicle designed by the apartheid government for policing and oppressing black communities in South Africa is now showing up in Black Lives Matter protests,” he says. “This along with the assault rifle are having a devastating effect on the streets of the US.”

His project, which is being exhibited in Northern California for the first time, isn’t your average exhibit for a Tribal Show.

Also on show are Ziman’s knitted regalia costumes, a beaded 1930s South African postal bicycle, as well as photos from his Bone series, in which he and the aforementioned African artists adorned 3D printed replicas of endangered animal species in beads.

The works range in price from about £4,000 to over £45,000 and will sit alongside other highlights in the Tribal Show, including Peter Pap’s collection of antique flatweaves, horse covers from Persia, and kilims from Turkey and Central Asia.

There are Navajo flat-woven rugs and pieces from Afghanistan, as well as one of the most complete collections of boldly coloured JB Moore rugs in the world exhibited in the American Indian Art Show.

The artist’s knitted regalia costumes will sit alongside more traditional cultural artifacts such as wooden masks at the San Francisco Tribal and Textile Art Show (Photo courtesy of The Rendon Gallery)

A Taos Pueblo Buffalo hide (circa 1890 to 1910) will be on sale for about £18,500; a Sioux War shirt (a traditional powwow outfit worn by the Native American Indians) will fetch about £46,000; while a rare Thai Court Cloth from an old Japanese collection has a price tag of nearly £58,000.

Kim Martindale who is co-producing both shows is excited about having the Casspir Project on site.

“It’s an extension of the important traditional beadwork done in Africa,” she says. “This is an example of how art evolves and historical mediums are used in contemporary ways. Fairgoers can see where these traditions come from and where they are going, which provides a deeper understanding of the art and culture.”

Ziman, 57, who was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1963, brought the 9ft-tall, 22ft-long vehicle to the US from South Africa in 2018, where they were just mothballed – “put in fields and left to rust,” he says, after being used as an “ultimate symbol of oppression” and to push away protestors of the apartheid regime.

He put the decorated Casspir on a flatbed and drove it to the port of Durban where it was loaded onto a roll-on/roll-off ship designed to carry wheeled cargo – “like a giant six-story floating car park”. “The Casspir did involve me getting an import permit as it is a ‘military’ vehicle,” he adds.

The Casspir being transported on a flatbed around the US to various exhibitions (Photo courtesy of The Rendon Gallery) (Courtesy of the Rendon Gallery)

Up to 100 local Africans in South Africa worked on the vehicle, which took three years to make with “every bead hand threaded or hand woven”.

It was a cathartic experience for the artist, he says. “It was the early 1980s and the army were being sent into the townships. It felt like a civil war brewing. I had no part of me that wanted to fight for a racist, totalitarian government. I hated apartheid. I hated what it did to the people around me, the people who brought me up and were part of our family.”

He firmly believes that we need to confront the past in order to deal with the present.

“Apartheid was a scar on South Africa that still has not healed. I personally looked on the Casspir as a type of penance. I wanted a bead for every person in South Africa. We estimated 50 million beads. In the end, we used 70 million,” he says.

He also wanted to document the injustices done. He took the Casspir to townships like Soweto and interviewed people who remembered “the bad old days”.

The message of the work in his show, he says, is one of peace.

“I believe that in covering this vehicle with brightly coloured beads it becomes less threatening... The beaded surface is durable, allowing the work to be touched, and it’s my belief that by touching the vehicle, the individual can take the power away from it,” he says. “Bend your swords into plowshares. End the violence, arms race, militarised police, and heavily armed civilian population.”

The San Francisco Tribal and Textile Show and the Antique American Indian Art Show will take place from 21-23 February at the Fort Mason Centre, San Francisco (sanfranciscotribalandtextileartshow.com)