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Recently there seems to be a resurgence of landscape painting on the contemporary South African art scene. Arcadia looks at this through the eyes of six contemporary painters and printmakers, each with their own interpretation of the landscape they find themselves in.
Banele Khoza and Rosie Mudge have approached this with a contemporary digital gaze in painting and printmaking. While Tamsin Relly and Ruby Swinney transport us with their ethereal brushstrokes from the Arctic Circle to the company gardens in Cape Town. Talya Lubinsky offers a conceptual sculptural edge with her masterful engagement with maps and Richard Witikani an older more established artist from Zimbabwe shares his love of rural life with his timeless landscapes of home.
“Landscape painting pulls me into the masterful balance of Arcadia, the ancient Roman poet Virgil speaks of a land, Arcadia, a kind of Eden, unspoiled, that is the home of pastoral simplicity, idyllic landscapes with objects perfectly positioned creating a timeless perspective. As we move into modern landscapes we push further and further away from these balanced landscapes into city highlines and manmade grey. Arcadia highlights these differences in our landscapes by focusing on the importance of nature. With an artist such as Richard Witikani landscape painting evokes the power of land and belonging, this against the likes of Tamsin Relly and Talya Lupinsky who closely engage with the role that man has played in shifting the landscape.” Says curator Amy Ellenbogen.
Artists include Richard Witikani, Rosie Mudge, Tamsin Relly, Banele Khoza, Ruby Swinney and Talya Lubinsky