I don't know whether the South-African artists you mentioned "cherished the opportunity to show alongside" (in another sentence you wrote) "artists they have only read about in magazines", but I know, that most of the ones you named have already ehibited several times ouside their motherland, last not least most of them years ago also in the House of the Cultures of the World. And I doubt that they would have liked your pointing them out as backwards, who really should be happy to be next to so much famous international artists. I doubt also whether Vivan Sundaram would like to be called "Geeta Kapur's husband". Maybe that's only my caucasian point of view. By the way, as I counted, the South-Africans in the 2nd JHB Biennale were not 70 (seventy), but not more than 15 in the main show of Okwui, 3 in Kims show, 1 in Mosqueras show, 3 in Kellie Jones show and 21 in Collin Richards show, which was meant to be a seperate (!?!) South African show. I'm very grateful, that you mentioned the Graz show "inclusion/exclusion", cause indeed there participated a whole lot of the 2nd Johannesburg Biennale artists, and as an art critic from Europe, who has visited that show in Austria too, it is pretty questionable why one has to travel to Johannesburg, only to see nearly the same selection as before here and in the neighbourhood.

Let me say also, that before your JHB Biennale in 1997 already 1995 the 4th Istanbul Biennale worked with the concept of non-national contributions, as well as the Kwangju Biennale did work with a team of international curators who choose non-nationalwise.

Fortunately, we must say, as the concept of passport-curated exhibitions is worn-out long ago. Therefore also the House of the Cultures of the World does not exclude caucasian views and cultures (see our programme on Reinventing Europe) - what would be a paradoxical, since we ourselves still are and remain.