THOSE WHO WANDER. A group exhibition of illustrators curated by Monique du Preez and Gerard Human at Salon‘91 until Saturday. LUCINDA JOLLY reviews.
“BEING an illustrator is not as hard as being a mineworker,”said illustrator Hanno van Zyl.
What began as a solo show of illustrations by Gerard Human was interrupted by the birth of his baby providing an opportunity for a group show by eight young illustrators. Their work although stylistically varied nevertheless provides a sense of the prevalent ethos among South African illustrators.
The positioning of illustrations by exhibitors Rikus Ferreira and Daniel du Plessis on opposite walls in the Salon’91 gallery creates a kind of playful, visual face-off between two young silverbacks.
Both illustrators use the highly saturated hot, fizzy, sherbet pastels colour palette that colour much of the show, apart from the few black and white exceptions from Hanno van Zyl and Jade Klara.
Ferreira’s illustrations often feature a tiny, Wicks bubble gum pink humanoid who is found in interiors and exteriors infused with the strange slightly uncomfortable atmosphere associated with dreams. Du Plessis’s illustrations feature a red, yellow-eyed, spade-headed, cock and ribs, Jock of the Bushveld type Staffie with loads of attitude shown in Karoo settings.
In one, the hound makes a strong scatological statement about cities and is depicted as taking a dump on a cityscape.
The artist has captured perfectly the rounded back typical of a dog at its business.
Although the context is different, as concerns the sacred rather than the secular, the dog brings to mind a Dutch painting by Gerard Houckgest painted 400 years earlier titled The Interior of the St Getrudiskerk, Bergen op Zoom which was exhibited in the show Baroque Meets Modern at the Old Townhouse. It depicts a dog defecating on the floor of the churches.
This “undecorous activity” is not blasphemous and has been interpreted as symbolic of the “transience of life on earth”. Later the dog was painted out by the “prudish” 20th century owner.
The general feel of this exhibition, the subject matter and their treatment by these 30 somethings leans away from the older, hard core political commentary style of Anton Kannemeyer and Conrad Botes towards a more social critique.
The pieces have a fresh, quirky feel with just a dash of edgy.
This group of illustrators seem to favour the personal and the individual suggested by the fringy ring of the title, Those Who Wander.
Liberation of a personal kind is found in Gerhard Human’s Outstanding Citizen series of sexy, long limbed brooding tank girls and their male counterparts.
There is only one skull which suggests that the trend of Dia de Muertos’ skull has receded at last. There are still some birds – large, scaled menacing ones and fantastical, globular, warty monsters still reign.
Titles are witty. Take Du Plessis’s Boko Haram (with Crocuta crocuta) of a highly armed dog astride a spotted hyena, Hanno van Zyl’s, Love in a time of Xenophobia, Ree Treweek’s, Shangoma, Livingstone as a Zombie or Sweh-sweh-shoe shoe and Jade Klara’s Swami Dog, a simple line drawing of a dog flying on a magic carpet.
Part of the appeal of Hanno van Zyl’s illustrations is his use of black and white in a strongly colour saturated show.
His exclusive use of black and white has a flatness that suggests a “coldness” and “lacklustre” mimicking the cheap reproduction processes, trashy paper and poor printing of comics of low brow art.
Using the discarded detritus found on the streets of Observatory and Woodstock, often recognisably iconic to South Africans, he comments satirically on our consumerism.
Look out for the quiet but complex pen drawings of Jean de Wet.
l For information, call 021 424 6930.