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“…her country, our country, but also nobody’s country, a myth of country in a constantly changing continuum of life and light that exceeds all countries.” – Alex Dodd
On a sunny Saturday morning I ventured over Sir Lowry’s pass and through the wasteland of Somerset West to Stellenbosch. Destination: The Ilse Schermers gallery in Dorp Street, somewhere behind that mountain there.
Ah, the Cape: Big mountains, expansive views over the Atlantic, and… expansive, drab, treeless, dismal – looking squatter camps. Are there squatter camps around Istanbul, I wonder? I think of that ancient metropolis because the artist Diana Page lives there, and her poetically – titled show, ‘Walking on a rim of light,” was about to open.
Page has lived in the evocative city of light for the past 16 years, and the work is a selection from the past six or seven years. Stellenbosch feels Mediterranean today, and the work seems right at home here. A travelling show is a logistical nightmare – all those big heavy crates, expensive and difficult to move. Not to mention customs and god knows what other obstacles. Undaunted, Page found a guy to roll the canvases – and shipped them to her first port of call, the excellent Oliewenhuis museum in Bloemfontein. And now they’re in Stellies.
You’d call this work abstract, no doubt about it, but actually we’re led in and out of a field where form coalesces and then dissipates again. There are glimpses of stuff we know: here, figures and buildings, there a cobbled lane, a face in a crowd. We’re aware of the calligraphy of the brush, its agitated or doubtful scratchings that lead us into gentle swathes of colour. It’s not about the topography or the specifics of place. It’s more to do with the global stuff, like light and its emotive effects. I had a little thought that yes, art – particularly abstract art – really is an international language.
Not content with one speaker to open the show, Page brought in two, both of them Phds. Outrageous! Talking about art is hard at the best of times, but Alex Dodd and Julia Martin did the business. They brought the gravitas with not a whiff of pretension.
Funny things, exhibition openings. Well – heeled folk mixing with bohemians, art – lovers, networking artists and some who’re really just there for the wine. I met some new people and caught up with some I hadn’t seen for a while. And then it was enough and I walked out into the bright mid -day sun. There is the smell of money in Stellenbosch these days. The streets are littered with Porsche Cayennes and Dylan Lewis sculptures. Pavement cafes abound, where the young and suntanned take their sparkling drinks. But the old Cape persists through these changes, a message from another, distant, country.
The show comes down on April 30, go have a look if you can.
On Monday I took it as my Human Right to search for a Pierneef site, and went through to Stellenbosch. I was here about a year ago and after a cursory drive through the town, I took the road up the Jonkershoek valley, for that is where “Die Pieke” are.
Stellenbosch. JH Pierneef 140x126cm
Freed slaves were farming here in the early 1700s. Later, the valley was found to be good for grapes. Vineyards lay alongside the road in the late summer heat. I scanned the valley for suitable dwellings, keeping an eye out for cyclists. I took the turnoff to Lanzerac Estate. Before me stretched vast lawns and a graceful old homestead, with well heeled diners to the left and Dylan Lewis cheetahs guarding the doorway.
close but no cigar
Given that uncle P often manipulated his subject matter for compositional ends, this seems like a good bet. The buildings may have been modified since the 30s, but that gable is just way too ornate. I headed on up the road to the Jonkershoek Nature Reserve and a fine old fashioned tearoom where the cyclists stretch their legs. I took a turn to the right into a place called Assegaaibos. Here was the gabled homestead hemmed in by a low wall and big oak trees. The peaks towered behind, and there were even low sheds nearby. But it just wasn’t laid out quite the way the painting says it should be. Does this house exist, or is this another of Oom Henk’s confections? The quest continues…. 
Ja. Sunday morning and I’m off to take a pic of the summer morning light on the old harbour in Hermanus. The shadows in Pierneef’s painting of the harbour tell us that is when he did his sketches. It’s a beautiful day and there are bright yellow kayaks paddling across a placid sea.
spot the kayak
What is on my mind, however, is that I need to do a blog posting, and I’m expecting a call any moment from my blog coach, who lashes me if I don’t do a weekly posting. What should I write about? My recent sortie to Cape Town and the elusive Cape sites? The almost-getting-to-find the Stellenbosch site? A detour into Bellville and its period piece houses? Or should I write about an old trip to Louis Trichardt? Which way to jump?
meanwhile in Bellville...
Coach, I need a bit more time to think about this. A bit of time on the couch with the Sunday papers might help to ease the blogger’s block.
the blogger,blocked
That there is my new best friend, Lulu. Hoping the old bastard will go for a walk.
With our blogger’s computer ostensibly fixed, some pics of the recce to Stellenbosch. What I was looking for:
Stellenbosch station panel
Driving into the town from the south the mountains were curiously shy, even absent. I ended up in the dorp itself, dodging Sunday morning churchgoers and Dylan Lewis cheetahs. Eventually I sniffed out the yellow leafed road to Jonkershoek. That’s where the mountain is:
the purple mountain
I kept on up the valley and at the end there were many cyclists and a nature reserve. I was too close to the mountain by now, but did this watercolour anyway. Its not very good but hell it was lekker up there in the Autumn sunlight.
retro - moderno - H20
Travels with Pierneef 