Local Art • 1971 • III
Battiss begins placing artworks in the advertisements section of British art journal Studio International. At least seven works are placed between 1971 and 1973. These document mobile sculptures such as String Thing from Africa and Mobile Monument to You; his travels; ongoing communication with Spoerri; and Fook mythology. He introduces Miss South Africa of the Future a.k.a. Dumb Dolly, a mannequin/rag doll created in direct response to draconian censorship laws in South Africa.
An entry from the timeline included in the exhibition Dada South? Experimentation, Radicalism and Resistance (2009–2010) at the Iziko National Gallery, which proposed connections between art production in South Africa and abroad against the social and political contexts that framed them. A revised version of this timeline was later featured in the retroactive Flight Paths (2011) exhibition guide commissioned by Clare Butcher.