The White Monday Disaster Series by Cecil Skotnes On Show at Oliewenhuis Art Museum

South Africa Fri 12-08-2011

The White Monday Disaster Series by Cecil Skotnes On Show at Oliewenhuis Art Museum
Press Release

Cecil Skotnes collaborated with well-known South African poet, playwright, editor, and novelist, Stephen Gray to create the White Monday Disaster series, which took the form of what the artist called a ‘block book’. By this, Skotnes implied a work in which the content was to be conveyed through prints and words simultaneously.

From the Series The White Monday Disaster, He Borrows the Diary's Horse by Cecil Skotnes | Woodcut Print on Paper | 1975

Comprising 13 prints and 13 stanzas in ballad form, this work commemorates the heroic efforts of Wolraad Woltemade, who, on horseback, rescued 14 of the shipwrecked from the ship the Jonge Thomas, when it sank in Table Bay in 1773, before he himself drowned.

Cecil Skotnes was born in East London in 1926. He studied painting and drawing in Florence, Italy after World War II and at the University of the Witwatersrand from 1947 to 1950 on his return to South Africa. Skotnes moved to Cape Town in 1978 where he resumed painting after decades as a print-maker. He died on 4 April 2009 at the age of 82.

The White Monday Disaster series will be on show until the end of October 2011.

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Oliewenhuis-kunsmuseum Persvrystelling

Cecil Skotnes, een van die vernaamste pioniers van moderne kuns in Suid-Afrika, se reeks houtsneedrukke The White Monday Disaster, word tans as deel van die permanente versameling op die eerste vloer van Oliewenhuis-kunsmuseum uitgestal.

Cecil Skotnes het met die bekende Suid-Afrikaanse digter, dramaturg, redakteur en romanskrywer Stephen Gray saamgewerk om The White Monday Disaster-reeks te skep wat volgens die kunstenaar die vorm van ‘n “blokboek” aangeneem het. Hierdeur het Skotnes ‘n werk saamgestel waar die inhoud deur houtblokdrukke en die woord gelyktydig oorgedra word. Die reeks bestaan uit 13 drukke en 13 verse in balladevorm. Dit beeld die heldhaftige pogings van Wolraad Woltemade uit wat, voordat hyself verdrink het, op ‘n perd 14 van die skipbreukelinge van die skip Die Jonge Thomas gered het in 1773 toe dit in Tafelbaai gesink het.

Skotnes is in 1926 in Oos-London gebore. Hy het ná die Tweede Wêreldoorlog skilder en teken in Florence, Italië, studeer en het met sy terugkeer na Suid-Afrika van 1947 tot 1950 aan die Universiteit van die Witwatersrand studeer. Skotnes het na dekades as ‘n druk-maker in 1978 na Kaapstad verhuis waar hy voortgegaan het om te skilder. Hy is op 4 April 2009 op die ouderdom van 82 oorlede.

Die reeks The White Monday Disaster sal tot die einde van Oktober 2011 uitgestal word.

Posted By: Diana Achieng

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