Gerard
Sekoto
(19131993)
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
To help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Van Gogh and German
Expressionists such as Kirchner. In your
second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Texture: scumble technique; rendering of
basket weave, walls and robe is effective
Space: forms pressed against picture plane;
claustrophobia
Unity: head acts as a fulcrum; radiating lines
Contrast: large shapes vs. small shapes;
yellow ochre vs. white
Emphasis: pose of the figure; we identify with
his thoughts
Poverty in the Midst of Plenty (1939)
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
To help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Mondrian and Van Gogh. In
your second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Street Scene (1939)
Line: geometric; organic
Colour: primaries; vibrancy and harmony
Space: shallow recessional space; evokes
two-dimensional quality of mass-housing
Texture: corrugated areas; blurred lines
Emphasis: figures at edges of format;
central area of emptiness
Prison Yard (1944)
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
to help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Kirchner, Mondrian and Picasso.
In your second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Form: geometric; reduction of identity
Contrast: dark and light; warm colours /
cold colours
Rhythm: repetition evokes movement;
prison warder has more vigorous
movement
Space: diagonals create unnatural distorted
space; flattening against picture plane
Emphasis: prison warder isolated through
difference; controlling force in environment
Song of the Pick (1946 – 47)
Line: repeated diagonal lines; curved lines
evoke idea of unified movement
Tone: extreme darks and lights; simplified
Write a paragraph of analysis on the Sekoto
tones
work, using the following headings
Rhythm: a pattern is set up across the
to help you structure it. In your first sentence
work; idea of one unified movement
note the possible influence of any one of these
Form: bodies reduced to basic geometric
artists. In your second sentence, note how
forms; background created using three
Sekoto develops his own language.
horizontal bands
Emphasis: no focal point; evokes dehumanisation and / or possible resistance
Historically, there was little documentation on the life of black
Artists working in South Africa. Apartheid permeated South African
society as a whole, influencing attitudes outside of politics, and
shaping scholastic opinions.
Sekoto was born on 9 December, 1913 at Bothshabelo, a German
Lutheran Mission Station. His father was a teacher, and later an
evangelist. Sekoto’s mother tongue was Pedi, Northern Sotho.
In 1947, Sekoto left for 46 years in voluntary exile in Paris, where
he died in 1993.
Sekoto’s rural childhood memories were treasured for his
whole life, and were a source of solace and strength.
At 17, he was sent to the Diocesan Training College
near Pietersburg to train as a primary school teacher.
Contemporaries included Ernest Mancoba and
Georges Pemba, artists who were also trained as
schoolteachers.
Sekoto taught for four years at Khaiso School, near
Pietersburg, in the Northern Transvaal. In 1937, he was
awarded second prize in a national Bantu art competition.
Ernest Mancoba, who also taught at the school, encouraged
him to paint, showing him paintings by Van Gogh, and using
Van Gogh’s life to show that life was indeed a struggle. When
Sekoto’s father died in 1938, he no longer had an obligation to
fulfil his dream for him to be a teacher and was free
to pursue his own aims.
His works may be examined into three periods for study purposes:
the late 1930s in Sophiatown; the early 1940s in District Six;
and, the latter 1940s in Eastwood, Pretoria.
Less characteristic works were made in Paris from 1947 onwards.
First Period – Works from the Late 1930s:
Sophiatown
In 1939, Sekoto went to live with cousins in Sophiatown,
Johannesburg. Discovering cheap supplies in a general store, he
experimented with poster paint on brown cardboard in works such
as Poverty in the Midst of Plenty (1939).
Poverty in the
Midst
of Plenty
(1939)
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Poverty in the
Midst
of Plenty
(1939)
Texture
Contrast
Space
Unity
Emphasis
Texture: scumble technique;
rendering of basket weave, walls and
robe is effective
Contrast: large shapes vs. small
shapes; yellow ochre vs. white
Space: forms pressed against
picture plane; claustrophobia
Unity: head acts as a fulcrum;
radiating lines
Poverty in the
Midst
of Plenty
(1939)
Emphasis: pose of the figure; we
identify with his thoughts
The vigorous brushstrokes of artists like
Vincent Van Gogh – evident in works
such as Sunflowers and Self Portrait
(Dedicated To Gauguin) (both 1888) –
was possibly an influence on works such
as Poverty in the Midst of Plenty (1939).
In addition, the distortion of the
human figure using expressive
brushstrokes by German
Expressionists such as Kirchner was surely
also an influence.
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
To help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Van Gogh and German
Expressionists such as Kirchner. In your
second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Texture: scumble technique; rendering of
basket weave, walls and robe is effective
Space: forms pressed against picture plane;
claustrophobia
Unity: head acts as a fulcrum; radiating lines
Contrast: large shapes vs. small shapes;
yellow ochre vs. white
Emphasis: pose of the figure; we identify with
his thoughts
Poverty in the Midst of Plenty (1939)
A friend encouraged him to show his work to Reverend Castle, a
teacher at St. Peters School in Rosettenville, Johannesburg.
.
Castle was so impressed that he offered Sekoto free board and
lodging at the school, enabling him to attend the school’s art
classes. Soon after, he was offered a temporary six-week
teaching post at the school. Castle also organised Sekoto’s first
exhibition at the Gainsborough Galleries.
A newspaper critic noted:
“The paintings by Gerard Sekoto are the
outstanding feature of this exhibition . . .
His canvases are marked by extremely good
colour and drawing”
Lutheran Church at Botshabelo (1939)
The motivating force behind works was his desire to use art to
communicate through the ‘inter-linking chains of humanity’.
“ My efforts when I was in Sophiatown were to arouse the
consciousness in our own people of the horrible conditions
in which they lived. Such an awakening would create power
to demand the right and knowledge to be able to
live like everyone else in the country.”
Although many of the depictions of Sophiatown have a lyrical
quality, the actual reality of the sordid surroundings is made
apparent in different ways in each of the Sophiatown paintings.
Interior Sophiatown (1939)
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Street Scene (1939)
Line
Colour
Space
Texture
Emphasis
Street Scene (1939)
Hints at the influence of the De Stijl artist Piet Mondrian (1872-1944).
Line: geometric; organic
Colour: primaries; vibrancy
and harmony
Space: shallow recessional
space; evokes twodimensional quality of masshousing
Street Scene (1939)
Texture: corrugated areas;
blurred lines
Emphasis: figures at edges
of format; central area of
emptiness
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
To help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Mondrian and Van Gogh. In
your second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Street Scene (1939)
Line: geometric; organic
Colour: primaries; vibrancy and harmony
Space: shallow recessional space; evokes
two-dimensional quality of mass-housing
Texture: corrugated areas; blurred lines
Emphasis: figures at edges of format;
central area of emptiness
Hotel Bantu (1939)
Yellow Houses, Sophiatown (1940)
In 1940, the Johannesburg Art Gallery purchased
Yellow Houses, Sophiatown, and until 1980 Sekoto’s
work remained the only painting in the gallery by a black
South African artist. (This same gallery had turned down his
application to be a floor cleaner because of his skin colour.)
Sekoto denied having been influenced by training or exposure to
other artist’s work. He did not try to conform to stylistic traditions,
or comply with conventional taste. Although his intuitive sense of
colour links his work to Post-Impressionists like Gauguin and Van
Gogh, he is separated from them by his subject matter. He looked
to the black people around him for inspiration.
His style of work was termed
“figurative expressionistic”
and he was often referred to as a
“social realist”.
Sekoto painted with deep feeling and active sympathy for the
black South Africans whose soul was daily being crushed and
bruised in his own Africa.
He used strong and bright colours such as red, orange and
black. His brushstroke was spontaneous and vital. Sekoto also
employed unconventional viewpoints, and handled form through
distortion and unusual perspective. He placed emphasis on
tonal modelling of form.
Three Women (1940 -42)
Second Period - Works from the Early 1940s:
District Six
Reverend Castle introduced Sekoto to George Manuel, a
Journalist living in District Six, Cape Town, and arranged for
Sekoto, his mother and sisters to live in a house opposite the
Roeland Street jail. This place was a great source of inspiration
for Sekoto.
His social / political commentary is implicit in these compositions:
he seldom portrayed white people, and then only as warders or
foremen. In 1943, three of Sekoto’s paintings were included in an
Exhibition of the New Group. This was an association of white
South African avante garde artists whose main objective was to
Upgrade the overall standard of South African art and increase
Public awareness of it.
Prison
Yard
(1944)
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Form
Contrast
Rhythm
Space
Emphasis
Prison Yard (1944)
Form: geometric; reduction of
identity
Contrast: dark and light; warm
colours / cold colours
Rhythm: repetition evokes
movement; prison warder has
more vigorous movement
Space: diagonals create unnatural
distorted space; flattening against
picture plane
Emphasis: prison warder isolated
through difference; controlling
force in environment
Prison Yard (1944)
One can see
the influence
of Cubism in
the analysis o
form as
geometric
facets in this
work.
Prison Yard (1944)
Prison Yard (1944)
Write a paragraph of analysis on the
Sekoto work, using the following headings
to help you structure it. In your first
sentence note the possible influence of
artists like Kirchner, Mondrian and Picasso.
In your second sentence, note how Sekoto
develops his own language.
Form: geometric; reduction of identity
Contrast: dark and light; warm colours /
cold colours
Rhythm: repetition evokes movement;
prison warder has more vigorous
movement
Space: diagonals create unnatural distorted
space; flattening against picture plane
Emphasis: prison warder isolated through
difference; controlling force in environment
Houses: District Six (1943-45)
His social / political commentary is implicit in these compositions:
he seldom portrayed white people, and then only as warders or
foremen. In 1943, three of Sekoto’s paintings were included in an
Exhibition of the New Group. This was an association of white
South African avante garde artists whose main objective was to
Upgrade the overall standard of South African art and increase
Public awareness of it.
The
Wine
Drinker
(1943-45)
Third Period - Works from the
Mid- to Latter 1940s: Eastwood
In 1945, Sekoto moved to Eastwood, a black township
near Pretoria. He shared a house with his mother and stepfather,
and his brother Bernard and his wife, Mary. These were the’ golden
years’ of Sekoto’s art and he painted prolifically, concentrating on
oil paint.
He was able to capture the transient moments of everyday
township life with an intuitive sense of colour and assured brush
marks.
Like Sophiatown, District Six and many other communities,
Eastwood was bulldozed to the ground in the early apartheid years.
Sekoto’s paintings serve as historical records of these
destroyed communities.
Self-Portrait
(1946-7)
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Portrait of Anna,
the Artist’s Mother
(1946-47)
The Artist’s Mother and Stepfather at Home in Eastwood
(1946 – 47)
The
Proud Father Manakedi
on Bernard
Sekoto’s Knee
(1947)
Outside the Shop (1946-47)
Sixpence a Door (1946 – 47)
“ Our home was close to the playing ground which was the
centre of the township.
On Sundays, Zulu dancers would come and put up a tent.
People would be eager to see inside, but many would
hang around with curiosity as they did not have the
sixpence to spend:”
Sekoto
Sekoto set up the easel and painted the scene in front of him.
This painting was included in an exhibition which travelled
between 1948 and 1950 to Belgium, France, Netherlands,
Canada and the United States.
At the opening of the Tate, the Queen Mother acclaimed that
she liked the one by the “native artist” the most, and Sekoto
was launched into the limelight. The painting was sold in 1991
for R 186 000.
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Song of the Pick (1946 – 47)
Line
Tone
Rhythm
Form
Emphasis
Song of the Pick (1946 – 47)
Line: repeated diagonal lines;
curved lines evoke idea of unified
movement
Tone: extreme darks and lights;
simplified tones
Rhythm: a pattern is set up
across the work; idea of one
unified movement
Form: bodies reduced to basic
geometric forms; background
created using three horizontal
bands
Song of the Pick (1946 – 47)
Emphasis: no focal point; evokes
both dehumanisation and / or
possible resistance
The distortion of
German Expressionism
is also visible.
The influence of the
geometric grid of
horizontals and
verticals of De Stijl
is evident in this
work.
One can also see the influence of
Cubism in the analysis of form as
geometric facets.
Song of the Pick (1946 – 47)
Line: repeated diagonal lines; curved lines
evoke idea of unified movement
Tone: extreme darks and lights; simplified
Write a paragraph of analysis on the Sekoto
tones
work, using the following headings
Rhythm: a pattern is set up across the
to help you structure it. In your first sentence
work; idea of one unified movement
note the possible influence of any one of these
Form: bodies reduced to basic geometric
artists. In your second sentence, note how
forms; background created using three
Sekoto develops his own language.
horizontal bands
Emphasis: no focal point; evokes dehumanisation and / or possible resistance
Song of the Pick is one of the most politically explicit compositions,
inspired by a black and white photograph which Sekoto kept with
him all his life. He reworked this theme again and again in his life.
In 1947, the financial support from his patrons, mainly Jewish
intellectuals, enabled him to leave the country for Paris.
The tragic irony is that he was forced to pay a high personal price
for his political freedom, as his art slowly lost its strength and
character.
Homage to Steve Biko
Irma Stern
(1894 – 1966)
Stern was born in Schweizer-Reneike.
She was a controversial artist during
her lifetime,
challenging expectations about
painting. Her career spanned more
than fifty years, with over
a hundred oneperson shows.
She
witnessed appalling conditions in
darkest Africa
and wrote 2 travelogues: Congo
(1943) and Zanzibar (1948).
Stern was assertive in her
professional life, but unhappily
married to her childhood tutor,
Johannes Prinz,
for 7 years. She had a nervous
breakdown after a
failed love affair, and was sexually
unfulfilled.
Several artists working
at the turn of the
nineteenth into the
twentieth century in
the Post-Impressionism,
Cubism and German
Expressionism movements may have been
influences for Stern.
She may have been
drawn to the
symbolic colour of
Paul Gauguin (1848-1903),
an artist who
also relied on his “inner
eye”, as opposed to a
naturalistic representation of the world
around him.
Paul Gauguin –
The Spirit of the Dead Watches
Gauguin
also
painted
female
nudes
in
exotic
settings.
The vigorous
brushstrokes of
artists like Vincent
Van Gogh – evident
in works
such as Sunflowers
and Self Portrait
(Dedicated
To Gauguin) (both
1888) - may also
have been an
influence.
A
revolutionary
approach to
the female
nude was
evident in
works such
as Les
Demoiselles
D’Avignon
(1907), by
Pablo
Picasso.
Picasso
fragments
form and
space.
The German Expressionists
were a profound influence,
and also dealt with the female
form using expressive
brushstrokes.
Western artists working in the early twentieth century were
fascinated with exotic art. The gunboats and steamers of
colonialism had brought back artefacts from other cultures,
and these were used as raw material by artists.
Colonialist Stereotypes
based on cannibalism, violence and notions of the
Noble Savage
became an inherent part of the work that was produced.
While there are fluctuations in Stern’s style in her most
prolific period – the 1920s to the 1950s - her
Subject Matter is relatively consistent.
Her portraits often involve semi-nude female forms in ethnic
finery, and dressed for initiation ceremonies. There is also a focus
on exploring different cultures such as Malay, Arab, Zulu, Xhosa,
and so on.
The Still lives involve arrangements of flowers, fruit, tribal
masks and cultural artefacts.
After World War II, Stern painted mostly European subjects.
In the 1960s, Stern paints field-workers, grape-harvesters and
fishermen.
Still Life with
Statue (1922)
The statue of a gilded
Christ figure is set
against a rich yellow
background.
Stern focussed on the flat
surface of the canvas and
the process of painting.
She creates a creamy
physicality of paint.
Strong tonal contrasts are
emphasised.
Composition (1923)
In works painted after her first major
exhibition, Stern continues to depict
sensual black women, presenting
them in states of semi-nudity,
and as young and nubile. Stern
patronised her subjects and their life
styles, regarding the subject matter
as visual inspiration, not considering
the social, political and economic
implications of their situations.
Details are exaggerated and stylised
to create an ideal image of a “noble
savage”.
It is interesting to note that Stern
never did any self-portraits, and it has
been suggested that she projected
her inner self-image as an
exploration of her own sexuality.
Stern’s response to Africa was romantic and exotic, reflecting the
Modernist interest in Primitivism originated by artists like
Gauguin as an alternative to the
materialism and rationalism of European values.
She believed in the concept of the Primitive and the Utopian, an
idyllic and exotic environment, showing scant understanding of the
power imbalances created by colonialism in Africa and detached
from the social ramifications of her subjects.
She felt that the ’natives’ were people detached from a historical
context, devoid of sociological meaning and enjoying a form of
utopia.
Pre-industrial people seemed to be living in harmony with nature.
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Repose (1927)
Working from her imagination, Stern places the Swazi women in a colourful
and decorative setting replete with naturalistic details like amaryllis flowers
and pawpaws. The composition comprises rhythmical line.
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Repose (1927)
Swazi Youth
(1929)
The controversial
response to her first
exhibition caused
Stern to travel across
Africa. Despite her
exposure to the brutality
of colonialism and
slavery, paintings
such Swazi Youth
depict black
Africans as
dominant in utopian
landscapes.
Pondo Woman
(1929)
The naturalism of the
figure is contrasted by the
stylised treatment of the
background. The figure
is represented in a state of
contemplation.
In the most recent cycle
test, only TWO Art
students in the whole
group wrote anything
resembling full three-mark
introductions to the essay,
and these still need work!
Leanne Adams writes:
As a result of “a culture of congestion” many
twentieth and twenty first century artists have
been forced to realign their art in such a way that
it fits in with this radical change in society.
Marcel Duchamp reworked the relationship
between men and women, displaying it as a
reflection of society today. Jackson Pollock tried
to return to a long forgotten “nature” through his
work. Jasper Johns used mixed media to create
a feeling of insecurity during a time of
uncertainty. Duane Hanson uses life-like
sculpture to portray societies evolution from the
“infinite complexity of Nature” to todays society.
I would prefer to read the following:
As a result of “a culture of congestion”, many twentieth-century
artists realigned the meaning in their art with radical changes in
society. The relationship between men and women in work by the
Dada artist Marcel Duchamp reflects a society in which
communication is fraught with complications; while even the
leading proponent of Abstract Expressionism, Jackson Pollock,
tries to return to a long forgotten nature using industrial paint.
With Pop Art, Jasper Johns uses mixed media to create a feeling
of insecurity and paranoia; while the absence of life in the
supposedly life-like sculptures by Duane Hanson of SuperRealism evoke the idea of a society far removed from the “infinite
complexity of Nature”.
Notice that the topic is stated in ONE
sentence.
You also combine your introduction to
TWO artists into ONE sentence.
State which movement they are from,
work chronologically, and underline the
movement.
Graham Strickland writes:
The ever-progressing force of technology is one that has
shaped our lives and mind-sets in the twentieth and twentyfirst centuries. Max Ernst was a prominent German Dadaist
and Surrealist who was greatly influenced by the progression
of a world removing itself from nature and expressed his
anxieties over this idea in his artworks from both movements.
Jackson Pollock was an Abstract Expressionist artist living in
America who worked with modern techniques, but instead
chose to involve his work with nature. Chuck Close is an
American photorealist painter whose work is executed using
every modern technique.
I would prefer to read the following:
The force of technology has shaped the life and
mindset of twentieth and twenty-first century humanity.
Max Ernst, a prominent German artist who made the
transition from Dada into Surrealism, was horrified by
the idea of a world increasingly removing itself from
nature and expressed his anxiety in works that belong
to both movements. While the work of the Abstract
Expressionist Jackson Pollock is closely tied to Nature,
it is often executed using industrial paint; while, with
Photo-Realism, the works of the painter Chuck Close
can really only be interpreted through the lens of
photography.
Maggie Laubser (1886-1972) was born in Malmesbury in the
Cape. Her first recorded participation in an exhibition was in 1910. There is
no further record of her exhibiting until 1922, when she returned briefly to
Cape Town from abroad. After her studies at the Slade School in London,
she had visited Germany, and then the shores of Lake Garda in Italy. The
two works showed her already schooled in the principles of Modernism.
Laubser went to Germany soon after the 1922 exhibition, where was
encouraged by Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. In 1924, she returned to SA to live
near Klipheuvel in the Cape. In her new phase in SA, her work focussed on
portraits of African and Indian men and women. In 1931, her entry to the
First Annual Exhibition of Contemporary National Art, held at the SANG,
outraged the conservative critic Bernard Lewis who fulminated: What shall I
say of Maggie Loubser's (sic) crude effort at portraiture? Is this dark wooden
face that of a coloured man or woman, whose pink shirt and blue scarf yell
at me from a background of beetroot-coloured hills and starch-blue shapes
which may or may not be meant for clouds? It is "modem" - it needs no
further description. Its crudity is a condemnation. (The Cape, 11.12.1931).
She died in 1973 in Strand.
Exposure to the heightened
naturalism of Dutch artists such as
Jan Vermeer (1632-1675) in Europe
would be a profound influence on
Laubser’s early work. However,
also notice the differences.
Vermeer - The Astronomer
(1668)
Blue Bells
Paul Gauguin –
The Spirit of the Dead Watches
As with
Stern,
Laubser
paints
African
figures
in
exotic
settings.
Repose (1927)
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work. Try to identify
elements common to both Laubser and Gauguin.
Indian Girl
Walter Battiss (1906-1983) was born in Somerset East.
He spent most of his boyhood in two isolated Orange Free State
villages, both situated in an area that is richly studded with
indigenous rock-painting sites. These areas were the
major influence on his life’s work.
Battiss experimented with many kinds of media in the course of
his career, including oils on canvas, woodcuts, and silkscreen
prints. He frequently applied lavish colour with a thickly laden brush
in his paintings in the manner of the German Expressionists,
overlaying this with calligraphic line and inscribed details.
Battiss was a very influential artist in
South Africa. He was constantly in touch with European art, and
headed of the Fine Arts Department at UNISA.
Battiss was profoundly influenced by the art of the San,
the original inhabitants of Africa,
writing two books on the subject.
He spent hours examining and copying
rock paintings in painted shelters.
He went on many trips locally and overseas, and was very
interested in archeology.
By 1950, Battiss related an inherited
Western artistic
viewpoint with an empathetic view of
indigenous artists who
worked on the walls of
caves and shelters.
Battiss developed his own
visual language
using picture-writing,
or pictographs.
His abstracted designs
are composed of calligraphic images
which tell a story symbolically.
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Yellow Afternoon (1950)
Yellow Afternoon (1950)
“I conversed with the
ancient men of Africa,
who spoke to
me through their
picture writings
on the walls of their crumbling
rock shelters.”
Battiss
Indigenous paintings are usually
characterised by the implied movement
of human figures interacting with animals.
The paintings are often palimpsests –
made up of images
drawn in differing techniques that overlap.
The space of indigenous art often has
a lyrical, dreamlike quality. For these
painters the material and immaterial worlds
could not be separated.
Battiss was strongly influenced by such ideas,
and tries to interpret them using his own
stylistic devices.
Fishermen Drawing Nets (1955)
As with Irma Stern,
in images such as
Bed Carriers (1941),
Battiss sometimes
views labour
as connected
to an idyllic landscape.
In his work
rhythmic forms and
lines take our attention
away from the labour
involved in drawing
fishing-nets.
Palimpsest No 1 1965
In many indigenous paintings
repetitive lines
set up energy fields, and we have seen
that Battiss was
attracted to this idea.
Works such as Palimpsest No 1 (1965)
demonstrate Battiss’s flirtation with
Pop Art.
The bold stenciled shapes and broad
contours result from experimentation
with the silkscreen medium.
Flight of Birds (1966)
Battiss, as with Irma Stern
in works such as
The Water Carriers (1935),
concentrates on the
expressive force
of brushmarks
and thick impasto paint.
Battiss creates a tactile
surface that is
texturally expressive,
frequently scratching into
wet paint with the back
of the brush.
As with Stern, his vision of
Black Africans is
exoticised.
Symbols of Life (1967)
Warriors in a trance-like state often appear to be dancing in
indigenous paintings. Symbols of Life is an abstracted work,
symbolically telling the story of a river and the varied life that it
sustains.
Battiss is portraying the river as a magical or godlike force
connected to fertility. He inherits the space of indigenous
paintings, where forms are often piled up on one another.
The linear calligraphic detail and hieroglyphic forms are inspired
by indigenous paintings, but also by Middle Eastern decorative
art. On his travels Battiss had studied the calligraphy of
Arabic scripts.
Later, Battiss
works with
another
South African
artist,
Norman
Catherine
(b. 1949),
on the
¥“Fook
Island”↑
concept.
With “¥ Fook Island ↑”
Battiss still explores unity
in relation to
people, plants and creatures,
the land, the water,
birth and reincarnation.
As with indigenous painters
he is concerned with
the entire tapestry of life and
afterlife.
Alexis Preller (1911-1976)
Preller
was born in Pretoria in 1911, and schooled at Pretoria Boy’s
High. He studied art in London and Paris, and was
influenced by movements such as Cubism.
The outbreak of World War II brought him to Pretoria.
Here he had his first exhibition of African subjects,
and became part of the ‘New Group’.
Preller joined the Field Ambulance Corps, served in North
Africa, and was captured and held as a prisoner of war
in Italy until 1943. The memories of war experiences
became a lifelong obsession and influenced his often
disquieting style.
Preller travelled extensively to Zanzibar, the Seychelles,
Swaziland, the Congo and Egypt. Africa was a stimulus to
his imagination. He was interested in tribal life and custom,
especially the Ndebele tribe. He was captivated by the
mystique of archaic cultures, legends, and by the rituals and
ruins of the past.
His travels allowed him to develop a private iconography.
He creates an evocative and detailed rendering of human
actions, dress and architecture.
Unexpected relationships are developed
and the process of metamorphosis in his works
has been generally viewed as surrealistic.
Identify the FIVE most obvious art elements or principles of
design that have been used in this work.
Basuto Allegory (1947)
Basuto Allegory (1947)
Involves a play of scale, with
miniature figures dwarfed by giant
figures. The simple activity of
drinking from gourds becomes
mysterious as the gourds
hide the figures’ faces. The face
of the figure on the left appears to
disappear. If one concentrates on
the top left-hand side of composition,
one notices that Preller is fascinated
with how objects transform into
people, into architecture, and then into
empty space. The depiction of a
noble savage taking part in an
exotic activity in a foreign world
may remind one of works by Irma
Stern. (Preller admired works by
Stern and Gauguin). Here the rich
patterns, habits and rituals of a
foreign culture become mysterious and
slightly
threatening.
Basuto Allegory (1947)
Preller’s work is
surrealistic
because he infuses the
ordinary with elements of a
dream world.
René Magritte - Time Transfixed (1932)
The Kraal (1948)
The Kraal (1948)
inherits the infinite space and dreamlike atmosphere of works by
Surrealists such as Salavador Dali. Preller’s objects are in a
process of transformation, and the giant candle and
phallic tower take on an iconic significance. The tribal architecture
takes on anthropomorphic qualities.
The surrealistic
qualities of
his style are frequently
rooted in the exoticism of
Africa, its past, and its
traditions.
Salvador Dali - The Persistence of Memory (1931)
Collected Images (1952)
shares the fascination of metamorphosis in works
by the Surrealists. The painting illusionistically
sets up a three-dimensional container of box-like
recesses which house the collection of
images that have become part of Preller’s paintings,
such as candles, eggs, tribal figures, heroic torsos,
and so on. He is concerned with how the
objects appear to have a life of their own and
metamorphosise
Collected images (1952)
into something else, defying our expectations.
Some objects appear to be miniature versions of
“real-life” figures, while others appear to break
through the walls of the room-like partitions in
which they have been placed. Preller works with a
kind of
“Magic Realism”
in which the illusionistic evocation of
exotic artefacts is illusionistically
made part of the
spectator’s world.
The stick-like limbs of the figures are derived from Ndebele dolls. The figure
on the left is a surrealistic “double image”, or visual pun, deriving from a seashell which Preller had picked up on a Seychelles island. The presentation of
woman as breakable object may be inherited from Surrealism.
Hieratic women (1955)
Woman with Lyre (1956)
shows the influence of Dogon
sculpture on Preller. The Dogon live as
a reclusive tribe in Mali, south of the
Sahara Desert, developing a culture and
mythology related to astrological beliefs
in Sirius – the brilliant Dog Star.
(Studies in the late 1940s proved that
their beliefs were grounded in
astrological accuracy.) Preller uses
objects as the basis for transforamtion
in these works. The volumetric forms of
Dogon sculpture influence his
representation of the human figure,
while the realtionship between tribal
forms and cosmological symbols takes
on the quality of science fiction.
Woman with Lyre (1956)
In Vase and Head (1956), Preller
juxtaposes a head that recalls
African or archaic sculpture with a
chipped vase on which a scrolling
floral pattern appears. It is tempting
to search for a hidden meaning in
works such as this, although the
painting appears to resist obvious
interpretation. His art is a generally
a private meditation, and objects
appear to be imbued with a personal
significance rather than with an
overt symbolism. The composition
is strengthened by four rectangular
blocks. The alternating warm and
cool colours produce subtle spatial
shifts, while the mind is teased by
the enigmatic imagery.
Vase and Head (1956)
As with Surrealism, processes of
tranformation become tied to
esoteric rituals
whose purpose
is known only to the artist.
Max Ernst - The Robing of the Bride
The Grand Mapogga
(1957) continues the idea of
associating indigenous,
“exotic” cultures with
surrealistic tranformation.
Rene Magritte- Philosophy in
the Boudoir (1947)
The tribe’s traditions, women’s
regalia and
uniquely ornamented architecture
was a source of fascination
for Preller.
The Figure
subjectisofathis
replica
canvas
of two
is the
studies
matriarch
carried
of out
the in
Ndebele
1951.
(or Mapogga
Conceptualised
tribe), whose
imagery
kraals
represents
surrounded
an intermediate
Pretoria where
state
Preller
between
lived. realistic forms and enigmatic figurations.
In The Grand Mapogga
figures transform into objects,
into architecture, into space.
The play in scale
is both playful
and slightly
disorientating.
Salvador Dali Gala and the
Angelus of Millet
Immediately
Preceding the
Arrival of the
Conic
Anamorphoses
(1933)
Rene Magritte Castle of the Pyrenees
Preller’s service with the Field
Ambulance Corps in North
Africa caused him to be haunted by
memories of front-line operating
theatres and mutilated bodies.
Throughout his post-war oeuvre
the fragility of life is often explored
in miniature still-lives. In The
Candle (1948), one is reminded of
the flickering transience of life.
The Candle (1948)
This theme is continued in
Still Life with a Painting,
Candles, Eggs and a Knife (1948).
Here the eggs symbolise embryonic life,
or life that has not yet begun. The knife
hints at ever-present destruction,
termination and division. The pictorial
imagery focused on the cycle of birth,
life and death refers to the vanitas
still-lifes by seventeenth-century Dutch
and Flemish artists.
Still Life with a Painting, Candles, Eggs and a Knife (1948)
The picture within the picture evokes the
idea of limbo –
or a place between life and death, with
miniature figures moving through time.
The lute recalls merriment in life, while
the harp refers to the journey of the
afterlife.
Discovery (1959), the central panel of a mural, shows no awareness of the pain
experienced by the indigenous people of Africa or black Africans. The notion of
discovery, far from being associated with colonialism and / or segregation, is identified
with a lush land of utopian promise that is Western as much as it is African.
Unlike works by Sekoto which depict the harsh
conditions under which urban black South
Africans lived, Preller’s figures are always rural
and involved in idealised activity.