Picture & Paper brings together works on paper by selected South African contemporary artists whose imagery engages with this material in unique, provocative ways.
Picture & Paper says Barnard Gallery is an exhibition that re-invigorates contemporary discourse around the signs we make and the surface on which we make them.
South African art has a rich and diverse history of works produced on paper, whether through graphics and printmaking, as a mainstream means of communication or as a politicised, coded – even subversive – medium.
After all, paper is regarded as a ‘democratic’ material. Its accessibility and affordability enables it to traverse the socio-cultural and political landscape. But paper as artistic material is also wrapped in ethical issues, its endangered status steadily accelerating in an increasingly environmentally conscious world. Today the medium is used by artists to address new and complex issues such as consumerism, the implications of the digital world on art making and to demonstrate a renewed engagement with various artistic processes.
And even in the paperless world of smartphones and ipads, paper continues to serve as the primary medium through which information is transferred. Whether through drawing, printmaking, the photograph, cartoon or comic book, the ancient art of making signs on papyrus has come a long way and looks here to stay.
Picture & Paper includes the work of William Kentridge, Deborah Bell, Anton Kannemeyer, Virginia MacKenny, Brett Murray and Lien Botha amongst others.
WHEN: 30 June – 28 July, 2015. Opening reception: Tuesday 30 June at 6 pm
WHERE: Barnard Gallery, 55 Main St, Newlands, Cape Town 7700
