Robert Slingsby Art South Africa - Review by Hazel Friedman for Winter 2006 issue In his book on Namaqualand, photographer Freeman Patterson describes this contrasting landscape as a “garden of the gods”. It is not the softer side of the Northern Cape that provides the most vivid illustration of its otherworldly propertie s. It is the desolate, jagged lunar-like contours of the Richtersveldt. This is Robert Slingsby’s spiritual and creative locus. Inspired by the San petroglyphs and the Nama community inhabiting this rocky hinterland, for over 30 years he has obsessively recorded its topographical markings, their interconnection with ancient societies and their role as a means of entering parallel universes. Access to these alternate realities is gained through rituals that allow us, if only brie fly, to see beyond the limits of our own perceptions. The most recent pit stop of Slingsby’s ongoing odyssey comprise two related bodies of work. The first was exhibited in the Bahamas and also at the Bell-Roberts . The second, which includes remnants of the first, was recently displayed at London ’s Square One Gallery. In a sense the Bell-Roberts show represents a return from self- exile by a widely acclaimed artist whose work, in the last decade, has fallen out of kilter with more fashionable trends in contemporary art. While many of his post-94 peers have renegotiated the politics of representation through new forms of cultural currency, Slingsby has remained focused, intuitively, on the “shamanistic” aspects of art, a paradigm that might seem anachronistic – quixotic even – to a discourse focused predominantly on deconstructing issues of this world, particularly ethnicity, race and gende r. Yet he has quietly forged on and his work has been championed overseas, in terms of its ability to transcend the constraints of geography and history. Entitled Power House, his ‘return’ exhibition revolves around the inexorable changes occurring in a landscape seemingly frozen in the romantic, ethnocentric imagination. Slingsby’s iconography is the idiosyncratic dwellings inhabited by the Nama, which are now being replaced – courtesy of increasing urbanisation and political wrangling – by faceless cement houses. Through bronze sculptures and monochromatic drawings he attempts to evoke the residue of a mystically charged landscape in which the soon-to-be demolished human structures feed off and encapsulate the potency of the environme nt. But while the sense of oneness is successfully evoked through the exquisitely executed bronze s, the monochromatic drawings resemble fortresses erected in a landscape bereft of people, blocking out, instead of embracing the ancient environme nt. Inadvertently they become a form of armoury for the artist himself. But in his Square On e body of works, Slingsby has returned to the exuberant colours anthropomorphic forms and multi-layered motifs of his earlier output. Consisting largely of mixed media panels, including corroded community artifacts and other fragile material traces, they suggest a process of incorporation and integration, rather than simply inscription. These works evoke an empathy with place that transcends ethnicity and changing techno- economic contexts. As such, they constitute the marking and re -making of individual and collective histories as part of a never- ending quest to locate the outer limits of experience , and to cross them. Hazel Friedman Art South Africa Winter 2006 Exhibitions Include: 2006 Square One Gallery, London (April) Square One Gallery, London (June) Cannazaro House, Wimbledon (July) Cannazaro House, Wimbledob artist in residence (November) Art International, Nassau, Bahamas (November) 2005 Selected as a finalist in Brett Kebble Art Competition Exhibition that was cancelled as a result of his untimely death. Art international group show Nassau, Bahamas Bell-Roberts Contemporary Art Gallery – Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 2004 Finalist in Brett Kebble Art Competition Exhibition `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 2003 Researching Stones of Africa Exhibiting in Korea `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 2002 `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 2001 Air Gallery, London Richard Demarco - On the Road to Meikle Seggie, as part of the Venice Bienale Research in Egypt `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 2000 Richard Demarco - On the Road to Meikle Seggie Edinburgh City Art Gallery, Edinburgh HANOVER EXPO 2000: GERMANY Stanley Picker Gallery, Kingston University, U. K. Slingsby Painting in Collaboration with YPO UNIVERSITY 2000 raises $250 000.00 `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1999 Osborne Gallery, London Bourne Fine Art, Edinburgh Edinburgh Festival – First South African artist in twenty-seven years to be invited. Invited to Malta Research in Egypt & Malta `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1998 Hout Bay Gallery, Cape Town Klein Karroo Festival, Oudtshoorn Lisbon Expo, Portugal Art Beyond Borders, Augsberg, Germany CNN Arts Club Interview EKHAYA, Travelling Exhibition to Tsoga-Langa, Uluntu, Guguletu. Sun Gallery, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town Gallery 88, Sasolburg IKHAYE. African Studies, University of Cape Town Bang the Gallery, Cape Town Hout Bay Gallery, Cape Town IDASA Gallery, Cape Town Worcester Association of Arts, Worcester `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1997 Groot Constantia Art Gallery, Cape Town Kunskamer, Cape Town Red Code, Perth, Australia Art Salon, Bay Hotel, Camps Bay Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1996 Association of Arts, Cape Town Robben Island Memorial Sculpture The Arts Association of Belville Primart, Cape Town Gallery 68, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town Gallery Atlantic, Cape Town Code Red, Perth, Australia `Art Salon' Bay Hotel, Cape Town Constantia Village Gallery, CapeTown Chelsea Gallery Kronendal Restaurant, Hout Bay Volkskas Atelier Finalist, SAAA Art Salon, Bay Hotel, Camps Bay Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1995 Primart, Cape Town BMW Pavilion, Cape Town Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Sisonke Association of Arts, Mitchells Plain Bellville Association of Arts `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1994 SA Cultural History Museum, Cape Town Everard Read Gallery, Johannesburg Quid Novi Gallery, Germany Seeff Trust Gallery, Cape Town V & A Waterfront, Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Sembach Gallery, Cape Town World Convention Centre, Singapore World Trade Centre, Hong Kong Very Special Arts Gallery, Washington D.C. Primart, Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1993 University of Stellenbosch Gallery, Stellenbosch Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Art Scene, Cape Town Skylight Gallery, Cape Town Art Salon, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town Constantia Village Gallery, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town ‘Cape Town Arts Festival’ V & A Waterfront, Cape Town Made in Wood: Works from the Western Cape, SANG Primart, Cape Town South African Association of Arts, Pretoria University of Stellenbosch Gallery, Stellenbosch De Oude Drostdy Museum, Tulbagh Primart, Cape Town Visual Arts Foundation, Johannesburg Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Bell ‘Art, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Seeff Trust Gallery, Cape Town South African Association of the Arts, Pretoria University of Stellenbosch Gallery, Stellenbosch De Oude Drostdy Museum, Tulbagh Visual Arts Foundation, Johannesburg Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1992 Primart, Cape Town Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Feathers Gallery, Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1991 Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Primart, Cape Town Gallery International, Cape Town SANLAM Collection, Baxter Gallery, Cape Town South African Association of Arts Baxter Gallery, Cape Town Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Labia Gallery, Cape Town Art Scene, Cape Town William Humphries Art Museum, Kimberly `20 Years of S.A. Art’ Kunskamer, Cape Town `Art Salon’ Bay Hotel, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1990 Gallery International, Cape Town Gallery 709, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1989 Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Johannes Stegman Art Gallery, Bloemfontein Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg Natalie Knight Gallery, Johannesburg Jane se Kunshuis, Paarl Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1988 “The Sasol Art Collection”, Rand Afrikans University RAU Durbanville Cultural Museum University of Stellenbosch Gallery, Stellenbosch Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Art Scene, Cape Town Skylight Gallery, Cape Town “Art Salon” Cape Town Primart Gallery, Cape Town Primart Gallery, Cape Town Constantia Village Gallery, Cape Town Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Volkskas Atelier Finalist, SAAA Kronendal Restaurant, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1987 Cape Town Festival Chelsea Gallery, Cape Town Volkskas Atelier Finalist, SAAA Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1986 Volkskas Atelier Finalist, SAAA Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1985 “Tributaries - a View of Contemporary SA Art ” for BMW RSA, Touring Germany Cape Town Triennial Competition Finalist, SANG Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1984 “Masterworks on Paper” SANG, Cape Town Gallery 21, Johannesburg Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1983 Gowlett Gallery, Cape Town SA Contemporary Realism, Pretoria Art Museum South African Association of Arts Gowlett Gallery, Cape Town Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1982 Gowlett Gallery, Cape Town Goodman Gallery, Cape Town Gowlett Gallery, Cape Town Cape Town Triennial South African Association of Arts Atlantic Art Gallery, Cape Town 1981 “Toys” The Hague, Holland La Tertulia, Amsterdam, Holland 1980 Sheraton Hotel, Amsterdam, Holland 1979 Posthoorn, Den Haag, Holland 1978 Gallery Galjoen, S’Hertogenboch, Holland Gallery ’77, Ijsselstein, Holland Nederlandse Fijnschilders, t’Kunsthuis, V H Ooste, Holland Gallery Ploemp, Delft, Holland 1976 Gallery International, Cape Town 1975 Award in New Signature competition 1972 First exhibition in Diocesion College - Bishops Art Loft COLLECTIONS INCLUDE ABSAPietersburg Art MuseumArtoteek, Dutch Municipal CollectionWitwatersrand University CollectionWilliam Humphries MuseumSASOL Public CollectionSouth African Reserve BankInvestec BankTelkomCape of Good Hope Bank Sanlam Public CollectionDepartment of Foreign AffairsSouth African Embassy, BrusselsBunders Bank, GermanyCoronationPepsicaRand Merchant BankSANTAMSEEFF HoldingsDeutsche Bank, Johannesburg (birthdate and memo here)