This year’s theme is ‘Codes in Parallel’. “Craft is a universal language that all humanity shares,” explains the IOTA curatorial team. “Where languages and dialects abound, languages lost or endangered, and literacy inaccessible, craft communicates where words cannot.”

Ceramicist Madoda Fani will have a solo exhibition featuring five of his ceramic works hosted by Bunbury Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) (between 10 August and 27 October 2024). The presentation titled Imbokodo, draws its inspiration from the Nguni word meaning "rock" or "stone," commonly used metaphorically to depict resilient women. This term gained significance during South Africa's struggle against Apartheid, honouring women for their unwavering strength amid adversity. The iconic phrase "Wathint' abafazi, wathint' imbokodo" ("You strike a woman, you strike a rock") became a rallying cry symbolising women's courage and determination in the pursuit of equality and freedom. Through his artistic expression, Fani celebrates the multifaceted essence of womanhood, as evidenced by five smoke-fired vessels bearing the names of five women.

The title also alludes to Fani's chosen medium, clay, which originates from rock, embodying both solidity and fluidity, impermeability and malleability. Delving into the dynamic between Zulu terms “imbokodo” and “nokubhokoda”, Fani explores the intricate interplay of pleasure and pain, intertwined with themes of penetration and permutation. Imbokodo serves as a representation of endurance, fragility, fertility, and the finite nature of existence, echoing the resilience of both women and the Earth itself.

Fani will also be taking up the Djilba Residency at Denmark Arts, supported by IOTA Ambassadors. During his two-month stay, he will deliver artist talks and workshops for local community engagement.

Sculptor and artist Patrick Bongoy is one of 12 artists and artisans exhibiting installations of crafted works at the Fremantle Arts Centre (between 17 August and 27 October 2024). He will be presenting his 2022 work Frozen in Time. Bongoy has cultivated a distinct relationship with his chosen medium, working predominantly with the rubber inner tubes of tyres and other waste materials such as hessian sacking, industrial packaging, found objects and textile offcuts. Through his arduous weaving, plaiting, braiding, cutting and stitching, Bongoy has honed a unique sculptural vocabulary. This undulating, multi-layered, textural language speaks to the capacity of contemporary craft to rework, reimagine and rewrite meaning. Bongoy’s practice largely reinterprets the ongoing human and environmental erosion, violent economic extraction, forced migration and exploitation in his native DRC. The making of his complex, layered sculptures and immense three-dimensional reliefs draws on traditional basket-making skills, while referencing the physical labour that defines day-to-day life in the country.

Bongoy’s hand offers the usually inert, harsh, light-absorbent material of rubber, an unexpected fragility and joy. This material transformation speaks to a broader intent at the core of his practice: the transmutation of pain toward hope, of a history of violence toward liberation of the mind, of reinvigorating what is discarded into an object that is both generative and abundant.

A further 200+ craft artists will exhibit in the accompanying festival program spread across over 40 galleries and art spaces in metro and regional Western Australia. IOTA’s flagship conference ‘Futuring Craft 24: The Value of Craft’ will kick off three days (3-6 September) of panel discussions, workshops, presentations and story-telling sessions with a focus on the issues and opportunities that contemporary craft presents now and in the future.

Visit the IOTA website for more information about the festival and programming.

Ceramic artists Zizipho Poswa and Andile Dyalvane participated in the inaugural IOTA back in 2021 - read about it here.