Notes

In The Poet Prince and companion work, O Poliziano, Alexis Preller pays homage to Angelo Ambrogini, commonly known by his nickname Poliziano, the Italian Renaissance poet and classical scholar, a close associate of Lorenzo de’ Medici in 15th century Florence. Both these works were shown at Preller’s last exhibition in 1975 at the Goodman Gallery in Hyde Park. The exhibition was characterised by paired examples of mythical portraits such as these, as well as those of Apollo and Icarus, two towers of Babel, a pair of shells and a final version of his climatic work, Marathon.     

Over a lifetime Preller had produced a series of symbolic portrait heads, unusual in that their prototypes looked as though they were precise renderings of sculptural fragments. Two early works of 1948, Head with Cracks and Greek Boy, appear to be accurate renderings of wooden sculptures with painful longitudinal fissures. The images resemble paintings of early religious polychrome sculptures or icons.

This late portrait of The Poet Prince belongs to a dynasty of works, a long line of iconic profile heads of mythical gods, kings, princes and angels. These powerful symbolic images of floating or disembodied heads all relate to this notion of a sculptural fragment. The semi-profile of this Florentine prince floats, disembodied, against a recessive dark field with a bright aquamarine silhouette on the far left. His conical red hat, similar to those seen in the intense Italian Renaissance portraits of Antonello da Messina, is topped with a shiny golden spike which is again mirrored below the neckline and collar sharply isolating the head from the recessive darkness.

The Florentine legacy of Preller’s work, here ambiguously could be read to have middle-eastern like qualities  in the intense sharply outlined dark eyes, black hair, sallow complexion, long nose and refined nostrils of The Poet Prince. The full lips, slightly narrowed eyes and sardonic eyebrows contribute to his enigmatic expression. The stylised beard is embellished with small shiny bell-like decorations that accentuate his aristocratic jawline. 

A number of symbolic Prelleresque conventions punctuate the work: a series of floating eggs or small spheres in duck blue are suspended ambiguously in space; jagged white forms flare upwards from the hairline and from behind the crimson red conical fez. Below, on the right, a more fluid version of these flares in white appear behind the poet’s neck silhouetting his flowing hair. This is counterbalanced by a similar sumptuous red form on the left echoing the dominant red fez.

Preller’s focus on this mythical wise young poet reflects his lifelong interest in Italian culture and the far-reaching transformative power of the poetic and the scholarly in creative endeavours, both of the past and in the present.

Esmé Berman and Karel Nel. (2009) Alexis Preller: Africa, the Sun and Shadows, Johannesburg: Shelf Publishing, page 321 and 373.

Esmé Berman and Karel Nel. (2009) Alexis Preller: Collected Images, Johannesburg, Shelf Publishing, page 82.

Karel Nel, 2017

We are grateful to Professor Karel Nel, co-author of Alexis Preller, A Visual Biography for this catalogue entry.

Exhibited

Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, Alexis Preller: Solo Exhibition, 12 to 29 November 1975, catalogue number 3.

Literature

cf. Esmé Berman and Karel Nel. (2009) Alexis Preller: Africa, the Sun and Shadows, Johannesburg: Shelf Publishing. A similar example is illustrated in colour on page 321 and 373.