3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions

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Subject: search.filters.subject.Artists--South Africa

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    Building as storyteller, layered narratives in a Karoo art town
    (2018) Pasch, Suzanne
    The tranquil Karoo church town of Nieu-Bethesda is filled with stories of a rich heritage which traces back to fossils from 2 billion years ago, to when the continents were one, to the Khoisan and Boer living on the foothills of the Kompasberge and to renowned, mysterious ‘outsider’ artist Helen Martins’s world of concrete and stained glass sculptures. The significance of the town lies in the layers of these narratives. Through the proposed interventions these stories will be told. Today, art and tourism is central to the town’s existence and identity. The small town scale architectural intervention acts as the new front door, the threshold, to a Nieu-Bethesda town museum and visitor’s exploration platform. It provides an introduction, a starting point from which the town can be discovered, and offers a guiding presence through its exploration. Die Sprokie Skrywer serves to document, preserve and celebrate the art town’s narratives and unique heritage through architecture while crossing the paths, programmes and learning opportunities of locals with those of tourists. Focussed primarily on the fascinating Helen Martins story, this study and proposed intervention also revisits the existing Helen Martins Museum. It complements the place with a new concrete and glass art hub that leads visitors to experience the ‘Owl House’ as well as a new sculpture restoration facility with specialised concrete and glass art studios. It takes guidance in technique and materiality from the knowledge passed down by Helen Martins herself and from the seemingly magical contents and characters which she brought into being. These sculptures stand today, arranged as she left them, at the ‘Owl House’ where she lived, worked and philosophised. Here the local creatives of the town will finally have access to much needed spaces and equipment to pursue their artistic careers and practice these art forms in the spirit of the town’s history. “This is my World”, Helen Martins used to say. This thesis steps into the ‘outsider’ artist’s creative mind to explore her “world” of biblical, mythical, spiritual and artistic healing. Visitors and artists who wish to learn about this specialised field become integral to the proposed program. The new intervention introduces a space for healing and creative development through Martins’ unique artistic techniques as a way of empowering the predominantly Afrikaans speaking, Coloured community challenged by poverty and alcoholism. The facilities merge the daily programmes of locals, artists, children and visitors through the business and practice of art. Architecturally, the town’s rich existing urban fabric and the Owl House’s unique spatial, material and atmospheric experiences served as a design tool palette. Traditional, vernacular Nieu-Bethesda building methods and materials inspired a restrained intervention, contributing to the identity of the town. To be the Storyteller the architecture must merge historical context to functional spaces while simultaneously offering a new, interactive model for tourism. It becomes a character in the story, sensitively acting as this small town’s guide who reveals and remembers, enhancing experience and understanding.
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    Routes/roots: reimagining the owl house
    (2017) Knight, Alexandra Mary-Rose
    Located in the town of Nieu Bethesda in the Karoo desert, the Owl House is a fascinating heritage museum that was once the home to outsider artist, Helen Martins. Much work has been created about the eccentric Helen Martins and her unusual home, and appears in the form of books, films, music and plays. The content of these works follow a similar pattern, and it is the aim of this research and film to explore a less literal interpretation of the Owl House, and its creators, Helen Martins and Koos Malgas. The Owl House is re-imagined through the lens of an experimental essay film, juxtaposing footage of the creative eastern imagery of the Owl House (in South Africa) with actual footage of the east (India, Thailand and Laos). In exploring these binaries, an investigation of theory of the landscape, home, mobility and hermeneutics takes place. Furthermore, these theories and concepts are looked at in relation to the politics of an apartheid, and later, a democratic South Africa. The Owl House is therefore analysed as the collaboration of the white, female Helen Martins, and the coloured, male Koos Malgas.
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    The role of artistic collaborations: selected comparisons from South African print studios and 'double act' artist collaborations
    (2016-07-29) Bingham, Niall B
    Collaboration in South African printmaking studios, both between artists and printmakers, and between artists working together in print studios are examined in this study. How South African artists have used the conventions of collaborative printmaking practices to complement their own practice; and what kind of dynamics can emerge from such collaborations is the primary concern of this study. Printmaking is widely viewed as a subsidiary, or supplementary practice to artists’ primary concerns in their particular medium of practice. It is important to examine the role of collaboration in printmaking studios, and how it may benefit, or hinder artists in their creative productions. To contextualise my study, I provide a brief historical overview of collaboration in Western printmaking; and briefly examine printmaking against South Africa’s political landscape since the 1960s. Recent critical observations on collaboration in the arts are introduced to foreground various categorizations and approaches to such practices. My research focus is not on the intricacies of collectivism in collaboration but rather on how a form of ‘teamwork’ collaboration in print studios can generate agency, within the context of concerns raised in my own creative practice. As a printmaking teacher, practitioner and collaborator, I hope these findings could be used to address some of the concerns experienced in collaborations.
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