Re-Purposing Our World: An exhibition at Tokara Winery currently on show

Tokara Winery feature wall

Re-Purposing Our World features the work of artists stirred by ever-present environmental concerns who display innovative ways to subvert our expectations through their use of material or choice of subject matter. Either directly or imperceptibly, their works reflect the state of our changing relationship with the natural world.

Two artists are specially featured: Maurice Mbikayi and Thirza Schaap, and 10 others are represented.

Thirza Schaap is showing paintings as well as photographic prints, from her ongoing Plastic Ocean series. On first viewing, these photographs depict what appear to be highly-styled compositions of the fashion world. Some evoke the petals of flowers or the tulle of ballet tutus, and their titles encourage this reading. But through the artist’s game of deception, the viewer is drawn in to discover that these curious, enchanting images of these photographs are actually built from carefully-selected and composed discarded waste objects.

This deception is part of Thirza Schaap’s message: she asks the viewer why our perception of value changes when we realise that the objects photographed are waste products, or whether they remain waste products at all?

Schaap’s ritual for ‘collecting trash’ along her/our local beaches, soon became a treasure hunt for peculiarly shaped plastics and debris expelled by the sea, to be transformed into temporary sculptures and photographed/which she transforms into temporary sculptures and photographs. By transfiguring them into art, Schaap questions the value of discarded matter, as well as the ubiquity of single-use plastics.

The Plastic Ocean series marked a shift for the artist from guilt to awareness, leading her to question every purchasing choice. She now asks: “Do I really need this or am I consuming out of habit?” Single-use plastic bottles, common discarded/waste objects, which she refers to as “empty vessels of destruction”, pervade her artwork.

Though different in style, but often depicting ‘still lifes’ of plastic bottles and other recycled matter, Schaap produces her paintings in order to process the ecological grief she experiences from her daily confrontation with unwanted materials littering the shoreline. As the artist has noted: “Our beaches are covered with confetti, but there is nothing to celebrate.”

Schaap’s work has been linked to vanitas, the 17th century Dutch genre of still life painting whose symbolic iconography included objects to remind us of the transience of life. The discarded matter in Schaap’s work confronts us as viewers with our own complicity as consumerists, while noting that it is our collective time which is limited. It’s really time to care for our environment.

Stephané Conradie

Ada van der Vijver

Petros Ghebrehiwot

Stephané E. Conradie is among the artists in Re-Purposing Our World, who utilizes found objects in order to question their material value. She creates intricate and entangled assemblages with ornaments collected from homes in South Africa. The artist examines value placement and meaning making through this domestic material culture, and how it has been shaped by Colonialism. Included in our curated exhibition is a curious, blue mutli-aquatint print which those familiar with Conradie’s compelling sculptures will recognise as a still life of one of these works. Much like Schaap’s photographs, one is drawn into examining Conradie’s print, as more objects become recognisable with the time spent considering the work.

In Ada van der Vijver’s screenprints Coke 2/12 and The Dead Lion 2/12, common litter items are delicately rendered into objects of desire and taste. They also serve as satirical commentary on the social-political state of South Africa during Apartheid. These familiar items of debris were intended to question the “not so clean reality” of living in South Africa at the time.

Petros Kahsai Ghebrehiwot’s screenprint Protection 2/6, depicts another ubiquitous litter item, the condom wrapper. In the context of this exhibition, this common item, like the proliferation of any other waste products, as well as the original use of the prophylactic itself, refer to the environmental topic that is as significant as life or death.

Witty Nyide’s linocut Ezifundzweni (Scholar), positions a large bee flying over a small, vulnerable girl, below. While the bee, an essential element in multiple ecosystems, is slowly disappearing out of sight and into extinction, the constant sense of unease looms large over our heads. Or is the bee guiding the scholar?

The photogravure by young artist Tshepiso Mazibuko Untitled 51/60, communicates her multifaceted experience with her local landscape of Thokoza, informal settlement.

Zarah Cassim’s Sleep 1, evokes the environment of a dreamscape upon waking, threatening to disappear, just beyond our grasp.

Helen Walne’s underwater seascapes immerse us in the beauty of our natural environments. It’s as if the artist wants us to breathe in wonder and help protect her paradise.

Willem Snyman’s hauntingly-beautiful lithograph Stellenboschberg 3/1 of a scene of the Simonsberg vineyards and mountains, brings those viewing the exhibition back to exactly where they are seeing the exhibition. Snyman lived in a cottage on the site of Tokara Winery before the winery was built.

Maurice Mbikayi – Self-portrait 5

Maurice Mbikayi – Mask of Heterotopia

The artwork of Maurice Mbikayi is fittingly included as part of the Re-Purposing Our World exhibition and was our inspiration for the exhibition. The artist is known for transforming discarded computer parts into intricate suits and sculptures as part of a world building narrative where the root causes of ecological issues, predominantly the effects of electronic waste on our environment, and new possibilities of approaching them allow consideration. Mbikayi’s Techno Hat and Techno Jacket, made from found objects and black computer keys, evidence the wear and tear from previous performances, and are displayed among the curated works in the exhibition.

Mbikayi is the first Tokara Supertaster, an initiative between Tokara and Julia Meintjes Fine Art where an artist is promoted through a long-running exhibition in the Wine Tasting Lounge, showcasing their work, and exposing them to new collectors.

We thank all the artists, Samuel Maenhoudt Gallery (Thirza Schaap), and 99Loop Gallery (Zarah Cassim) for their part in supporting us for this exhibition.

View all the works in the exhibition below: click on a thumbnail to give you details about the work.

Visit the exhibition in person at Tokara Winery, Helshoogte Road, Stellenbosch.

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