The New Colonials, Lithographs

South Africa Mon 30-01-2012

The New Colonials, Lithographs
The Artist Press

In these lithographs Diane Victor takes on the issue of China’s relationship to Africa. Miss September is a teenager dangling a posy of blossoms over the nose of a rhino skull. The poaching of rhino and sexploitation of young women are depicted with the finest lines.

“The lion who loved the lady” is from an Aesop’s fable “The Lion and the Farmer’s Daughter”. A story about a lion and a young woman, which teaches us not to indulge our desires.  A lion that had fallen in love with a young woman went to the woman's father to ask for her hand in marriage. The father was afraid to refuse the lion's offer, but asked him first to have his teeth and claws taken out; otherwise the lion could only arouse his daughter's terror. The lion was so in love with the woman that he agreed to the bargain. When the lion came back and approached the farmer, now naked and defenseless, the farmer clubbed him to death. If you follow your enemies' advice, you will run into danger. Victor selected the lion to represent Africa and the farmers’ daughter represents China.

"Migrant Labour (Flying Horse)", an open mine below, three African mineworkers huddle on the back of a triumphant flying horse based on a Bronze Galloping Horse Treading on a Flying Swallow, sculpted 2000 years ago in China. Instead of a swallow this horse flies on a raven. Below them the mineral wealth of Africa lies exploited and leaves a huge hole in the verdant growth of the African bush. An African monument to selling off our assets to the new colonisers.

_{Title: The lion who loved the lady}

_{Medium: Three colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 25}

_{Size: 50 x 65cm}

_{Price: R 6 200}

_{Title: Miss September}

_{Medium: Two colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 25}

_{Size: 50 x 65cm}

_{Price: R 6 200}

_{Title: Migrant Labour (Flying Horse)}

_{Medium: Single colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 25}

_{Size: 50 x 65cm}

_{Price: R 6 200}

Lithographs

With these prints we had the meeting of two perfectionists in the studio, Mark Attwood the master printer and Diane Victor the maestro. She presented Attwood with a daunting challenge; turning a smoke portrait into a print. Perhaps best described by the Michael Stevenson Gallery as "smoke deposits on paper" turning these fugitive images into solid prints are just the technical thing to get an obsessive printer going. She worked on the image by holding the grained film (attached to a board) above her head, with a burning candle in the other. She then "drew" with the smoke to create beautiful but disturbing portraits of men. Like the smoke their presence is elusive and yet enduring. Getting the plates to print and getting the roller pressure just right was complicated by the artist being a printer in her own right. Eventually a mere mortal had to intervene to tell them that the prints were brilliant and that existential despair could not scupper this project.

The Usher(self portrait with goat) plays with the ambiguity of who is the usher and who is not. Is the goat showing Victor the way or is she the usher of its death? Our relationship with animals is complicated, by eating them and causing their death we ensure that they first live.

In the prints "Our lady of the Stains" and "Our Lady of the Bromeliads" Victor combined delicate pencil drawing (in the studio we have decided that women win the drawing prize, hands down!! See Judith Mason

and Hanneke Benade for further proof) with tusche washes that maximizes the potential of lithography. These images continue Diane Victor's interest in using religious icons and figures as vehicles for her social commentary. Diane Victor deals almost transgresively with the boundaries between ecstasy and terror.

A wall eyed Madonna figure is pierced by Bromeliads (flowering in the garden at the time), which adorn and disfigure her at the same time. The soft colours of the plants and the intricacy of their flowers are contrasted by their brittle spiky feel. Like the Madonna they are also tough and do well in dry shady conditions.

In "Our Lady of the Stains" the woman is caught in the throws of either religious or sexual ecstasy or perhaps the pain of being shot. Brownish purple and black stains "explode" on the image, their translucency revealing details of the fine drawing beneath them.

Diane Victor has won numerous awards (since the time of being a student, some twenty years ago) and has exhibited widely within South Africa and overseas. Her work is in leading South African corporate, state and private collections (where it has been known to stir up staff sensitivities) as well as in international collections including the Museum of Modern Art in New York (her Disasters of Peace prints being purchased to compliment the museums collection of Goya's "Disaster's of War"). She should be declared a national treasure.

_{Title: The Usher (self portrait with goat)}

_{Medium: Single colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 25}

_{Paper size: 76.4 x 57cm}

_{Image size: 60.8 x 45.8cm}

_{Price: R 7 500}

_{Title: Our lady of the Bromeliads}

_{Medium: Two colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 30}

_{Size: 65 x 51cm}

_{Price: R 6 200}

_{Title: Our Lady of the Stains}

_{Medium: Two colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 30}

_{Size: 65 x 51cm}

_{Price: R 6 200}

_{Title: Smoke I}

_{Medium: Single colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 10}

_{Size: 65 x 51cm}

_{Price: R 7 400}

_{Title: Smoke II}

_{Medium: Single colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 10}

_{Size: 65 x 51cm}

_{Price: R 7 400}

_{Title: Smoke III}

_{Medium: Single colour lithograph}

_{Edition size: 10}

_{Size: 65 x 51cm}

_{Price: R 7 400}

Posted By: Andrew Njoroge

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