Barnard is pleased to present Echo, a curated exhibition of works by selected emerging and established artists. Drawn from both the primary and secondary markets and exploring the mediums of painting, printmaking and photography, the works in this exhibition straddle different time periods in the past decade.
Echoing earlier or previous conversations while engaging new ones, this collection explores diverse narratives relating to notions of identity, memory and geography. These recurring themes and motifs reverberate within this collection of works where individual pieces become sounding boards for their various counterparts.
Local lens-based artist Lien Botha’s ‘Wonderboom’ series (2015), produced to accompany her award-winning novel of the same name, explores a post-apocalyptic South Africa. Each photograph in the series of 18 works relates to a chapter from the book and investigates themes of memory, identity and reality.
‘Diatola’ (2014), the work of Sowetan born Mohau Modisakeng, also explores the idea of visual narrative but is more performative in nature. Citing the influence of his mother, a ‘prophetess’, his images invoke dreams and visions that become markers of a personal and collective memory intertwined with the violent legacies of South Africa’s troubled past and the resulting deep divides of the post-apartheid present.
Other works in the exhibition engage a natural history considering both the beauty and fragility of various habitats. In his painting, titled ‘Bleu de Hue’, Johannesburg based artist Jaco van Schalkwyk presents the viewer with a large monochromatic landscape that explores the possibility of an otherworldly or alternate landscape - a subtle but timeous comment on the current state of man’s relationship to this place we call ‘home’.
Sharing this environment, various creatures also feature in the conversation between art works in the exhibition highlighting both the beautiful and brutal relationship that exists between humans and animals. Central to this dialogue is Virginia Mackenny’s ‘Dancing with Doubt’ (2016-2017) juxtaposed with images of chickens for slaughter at a Sowetan roadside market by Johannesburg photographer Tshepiso Seleke; more subtle and symbolic are Peter Eastman’s ‘Leopards’ and the white dove in Modisakeng’s ‘Diatola’.
The exhibition is open to view at Barnard Gallery from 7 – 29 November and includes works by artists Mohau Modisakeng, Lien Botha, Peter Eastman, Tshepiso Seleke, Virginia MacKenny, Norman Catherine, Diane Victor, Richard Mudariki, Ibim Cookey, Maria Torp, Tom Cullberg, Alastair Whitton, Jaco van Schalkwyk and Alexia Vogel.
