Where it all began…

I was going through some old photographs the other day, and came upon several  images of my very early batik work. These got me thinking about what inspired that work and what has happened since then that has led me to the point that I am at now.

I have always found it difficult to talk about my work without first explaining where I come from. So, today I am going to share with you the images that I found, and in the next few posts, I will fill in some of the background.

From a South African magazine article featuring me with my batik work in 1982

A nostalgic interpretation of the river on our old family farm in Zimbabwe. 1982

A batik depicting a Fish Eagle in the Okavango Delta of Botswana. 1981

My artwork documents my life’s journey, so in order to understand the work, you will need to know a little of the road that I have taken. In my next post, I will tell you about the family that I come from and give you a glimpse into a childhood spent playing in African soil.

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Hearthstone: A poem

Over the years I have been blessed to have many talented people visit my art studio. One such couple, from Nova Scotia, Canada, were fibre artist Valerie Hearder and her poet husband,Veryan Haysom. After showing them my artwork and spending an entertaining few hours having lunch in the garden, they departed with a sprig of lavender I had given them, perched upon their dashboard.

Lavender

A few weeks later, I was delighted and touched to receive the following poem from Veryan:

Hearthstone

(for Sally Scott)

           

Your sprig of lavender on the dashboard,

            reagent separating sage and purple

            from the Oteniqua and Tsitsikamma,

divined flowers between ranges – violet and amethyst

pooled like Langkloof lakes – and scented our journey

with earth-embedded rain,

mordant for the making of this land.

It needed to be made – this place of rusted bottle-caps

flat on whorls of thread-bound string,

this meld of miner and seamstress –

            grace in gumboots and flames in grass –

this realm of layers peeling prints of char

from underfoot shoots through morning dew.

They needed to be made – fiber-beaten stones,

veldt rags, red silt tatters, dry-river cloths annealed

in a furnace of rock ruins to the sorrow

of an unforgotten farm, and your garden –

a release from sand’s memory

and the melt of high latitudes.

Aloes, too, needed to be made –

spikes, orange and crimson, on leafless

stems rising from rosettes rooted in grassless

barrens. Flowers against the blue aridity of sky –

colour of the unseen core

mark of the maker of this land

  ancient fire seared in.

Veryan Haysom

Thank you, Veryan!

To see what Valerie does, visit her websites: www.valeriehearder.com/ and www.africanthreads.ca/

Valerie Hearder

To all my friends around the world, I send blessings for a peaceful and creatively productive 2013.

Telegram

Welcome to my first post! As a way of introduction, I would like to share with you a poem that was written for me by my good friend and poet Harry Owen, in response to his visit to my home and studio. The title of the work is inspired by my old studio door that has a slot through which one can post letters and telegrams:

By Harry Owen

KUDU SKULL HEAVY ON TIN ROOF

MAKES OBEISANCE [STOP] GARDEN EARTH

PRICKLES INTO AIR   GROWS LIKE BONE

OR NAIL [STOP] HONEST SOIL [STOP]

WHEELS   RUSTED SINKS   BROKEN POTS   THE ART

WE LEAVE BEHIND AS

REMEMBERED

WE BREATHE [STOP]

WHO CLINGS OVER THERE

TO ASPHALT EXISTENCE [QUERY]

NO LACK OF POTENTIAL   ONLY

OF COURAGE [STOP] FREEDOM   THAT IS [STOP / STOP]

SAD [STOP]

HADEDAS   PAIRED WEATHER VANES

GROOM QUIETLY

SCRAWP THEIR WAY OFF

INTO PREHISTORY   TAKING US WITH THEM

[DON’T STOP / DON’T STOP / DON’T STOP]

[STOP]