February 8, 2006
By Thabang Mokoka
NEIGHBOURS Joburg and Ekurhuleni are working together - and student artists are benefiting from the partnership.
A co-hosted exhibition, Confluence: A Union of Two Streams, a Meeting Place, is on at the Johannesburg Art Gallery, featuring a wide variety of artworks in diverse media. In total, 27 art students from Ekurhuleni and 23 from Johannesburg have work on show.
The Joburg gallery was selected to hold the exhibition because of its spacious facilities and resources, according to one of the curators, Prince Dube.
Exhibition curator Prince Dube with some of the artworks
The students attend weekly classes at either the Johannesburg Art Gallery Saturday School or the Tembisa Art Development School.
Primary school children attend the Saturday school in the morning, while the afternoons are reserved for adults; classes take place at the Tembisa school on Mondays to Thursdays from 3pm to 5pm. All the classes are free.
Portraits dominate the exhibition. On entering, the visitor is confronted by a painting of a woman. She oozes femininity, but at the same time the viewer gets a striking sense of the burdens she carries.
Colour plays an important role in the painting - the dark blue skies juxtapose the figure, making her stand out clearly.
Portraits dominate the exhibition
Other works on display include sketches, watercolour and oil paintings and collages. A favourite of Dube's is a collage by Themba Ngxetwane, called Still Life. It uses a lot of texture, colour, mood and mixed media to bring all the artist's ideas into one piece.
The artwork is an amalgamation of magazine and paper cuttings, sketches and pastels, allowing the viewer to build on its meaning at each viewing.
People wanting to buy any of the works on display are referred to the respective artists, Dube says, adding that the Joburg gallery does not get involved in the sales. So far seven pieces have been sold, including work by Ngxetwane.
At the schools, one of the subjects covered is art economics. This is to help young artists manage the financial side of their business. Dube, however, does not think it is a good idea for aspiring artists to be thinking of the price tags for their art so early in their careers.
He describes how he has seen some great artists lose focus on the art and dwell too much on the money. Yet he is keenly aware of the pride the artists feel when they exhibit their work. The young children don't see much value in the exhibition, he says, but they feel proud to show their parents their work. The adult artists are simply "over the moon".
The exhibition, which opened on 28 January, runs until 13 February. The Johannesburg Art Gallery is on the southern border of Joubert Park; the entrance is on King George's Street. The gallery is open on Tuesdays to Sundays, from 10 am to 5pm. Entrance is free.
For more information about the exhibition or the gallery's Saturday school, contact Prince Dube on 011 725 3130. The Tembisa Art Development School can be contacted on 011 391 4007.
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