Artists for a New South Africa (ANSA), UCLA Fowler Museum, and Santa Monica First United Methodist Church present The Keiskamma Altarpiece, along with special programming, March 13-23, 2007.

Tuesday, March 13, 2007
10:00 AM - 8:00 PM
Santa Monica First United Methodist Church
1008 Eleventh Street
Los Angeles, CA 90095

This display is the Keiskamma Altarpiece's final stop on the Los Angeles Community Tour, coordinated by ANSA.

Schedule of Events:
Tuesday, March 13, 7:30pm: Dr. Carol Hofmeyer, Hamburg AIDS Doctor and founder of the Keiskamma Art Project, presents the altarpiece.

Sunday, March 18, 9:00am – 7:30pm: Full day of events including services, film screening, and youth activities surrounding the altarpiece.  Click here for details. 

Monday, March 19, 7:30 pm: Service of Christian Unity with St. Monica Catholic Church, First Presbyterian Church and St. Paul's Lutheran Church.

Thursday, March 22, 7:30 pm: Edwin Bayrd, Associate Director, UCLA AIDS Institute, lectures on the history of the altarpiece.

Sunday, March 25: Food Drive to benefit Imani Unidos AIDS Project Food Pantry  -- this event is not part of the viewing and the Altarpiece will NOT be on display this day.

Public Viewing Hours: 10am – 8pm daily (with the exception of Saturday, March 17 when the hours are 10 am – 6 pm)

About the Altarpiece:

The Keiskamma Altarpiece is a present-day folk-art masterpiece from South Africa, created by over one hundred rural women artists whose lives are deeply impacted by HIV/AIDS, poverty, and other significant hardships, as a message of hope for their community, country, and the larger world.   The Altarpiece is a progressive adaptation of a classical religious work that replaces traditional religious iconography with images of black women and vulnerable children who are the "saints" in their community's struggle against AIDS.

The colossal Keiskamma Altarpiece uses embroidery, beadwork, wire sculpture, and photographs. It measures 13 feet high by 22 feet long and is composed of a series of hinged panels that utilize the imagery of the Xhosa people of the Eastern Cape to depict life and the impact of AIDS in the region. Fully opened, the altarpiece reveals dramatic, life-size photographs of three local grandmothers and their grandchildren, some orphaned by AIDS, and the community's hope for the future.

Dr. Carol Hofmeyr became Hamburg's first and only AIDS doctor in 2002. She and her husband have since built an AIDS hospice and treatment center in Hamburg. They have also launched a community-wide effort to encourage everyone to get HIV tests to prevent new infections, and to get those who are infected into treatment. Dr. Hofmeyr also holds a degree in fine arts as well as medicine. She has involved the local women of her adopted community in a series of projects that use art as a means of commemorating the lives lost to AIDS and of consoling those who remain behind. One of these projects became the Keiskamma Altarpiece. It will be a great honor to have her with us on the first day that the Altarpiece is on display in our church.

Cost : Free and open to the public; free parking is available across from the church on 11th Street.

www.ansafrica.org

Sponsor(s): Fowler Museum at UCLA, Artists for a New South Africa, Santa Monica FUMC, First Presbyterian Church of Santa Monica, St. Paul's Lutheran Church, Saint Augustine by the Sea Episcopal, St. Monica Catholic Church and Santa Monica Synagogue.