Figuring from within : a study in history, painting and the work of Moses Tladi

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study explores the significance of landscape painting in my own work and in the work ofMoses Tladi, one of the lesser-known SA pioneer artists working in the oil painting convention.Through a Romantic lens, I argue that Tladi's paintings exist as record of his experiences, thoughtsand emotions, making use of a hermeneutics 'from within', rather than one aimed at Realist exposition.While employing such a hermeneutics in my own practice, I seek out points of connectionbetween Tladi and myself, as well as explore if and to what degree our different socio-political circumstancesshape our practices.In part one of the thesis I sketch a narrative backdrop to the era in which Tladi lived and of hisrelationship to his patrons, mentors and the establishment. I explore his work in relation to popularconventions at the time, matters of modernism and abstraction, as well as to some degree how thelandscape genre functions in terms of class. The overall argument is divided in two parts, that ofthe metaphorical 'Garden' and that of the 'Wilderness'. With this divide I aim to reveal how Tladiemploys the transcendent both in the sublime expanse of Sekhukhuneland and in his domestic,everyday reality. The ideological relationship between the Garden and Wilderness is examined interms of theories on landscape, imperialism and the Lutheran missionary project.In the second part I describe my own work and discuss the contribution it makes. While alludingto many of the devices already discussed in Tladi's work, I sketch the context in which my ownpaintings were made and explain some of my stylistic and curatorial choices. In demonstrating howour techniques and methodologies overlap, I aim to cristallise some of the theoretical themes explored.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University