Perspectives on Africa
Live Virtual Auction, 17 February 2025
Perspectives on Africa
About the SessionStrauss & Co is pleased to present Perspectives on Africa, a sale that explores the complexity, beauty, and fluidity of perspectives through African art and works by artists with strong ties to the continent. The sale coalesces the rich and varied connections between Africa and its artistic expressions, presenting works that span figuration, landscape, and abstraction, inviting collectors to engage with powerful narratives emerging from Africa's evolving perspectives. The works reflect layered meanings, both as a method of representing depth and dimension as a way of framing our understanding of the world. Work by Contemporary artists reflects on the historical foundations of Modernist artists, exploring themes such as identity, belonging, urbanisation, and re-encounters with tradition, while the sale transitions to Modernist interpretations of Africa, exploring the complexity of colonial encounters, post-independence aspirations, and indigenous practices. Building on Strauss & Co’s commitment to developing a strong local photography market, the sale includes an artist focus on the work of social documentarian Paul Alberts, whose images captured poignant narratives of everyday life, particularly in Cape Town. These works sit alongside David Goldblatt and Zanele Muholi, whose visceral images explore themes of identity, social justice and the multifaceted realities of African life.
About this Item
signed
Provenance
Acquired from the artist by the current owner.
Notes
The present lot, featuring a farmer herding their cattle, exemplifies Trevor Makhoba’s celebrated productions of social-realist portrayals of rural KwaZulu-Natal life. This quiet pastoral scene deviates from the artist’s typical provocative paintings which grapple with taboo themes of race, gender, sexuality and political change though still provides a poignant commentary on the life of those living in the region.
This work takes on a different tonal appearance to his later works, being grounded in a naturalistic palette instead of highly vibrant and contrasted compositions. The brush strokes are short and distinct, suggesting an element of life-drawing and ‘sketchiness’ instead of a planned and meticulous composition.
This work appears to be a possible study for Makhoba’s Azibuye Emasisweni (1999), currently in the collection of the South African National
Gallery. The title alludes to a return to the source. This work served as an example of the interface between the traditional symbols of wealth, represented by cattle, and the modern development of the tarred road they are being herded upon. This providing social-realist commentary of the transition into a new-age of South Africa, reclaiming a once divided land and a shift towards equal economic opportunity. Furthermore, a reproduction exists as a stamp, executed as an offset lithograph and produced in 2005.1
Trevor Makhoba, a self-taught artist of remarkable originality, is celebrated for his provocative paintings from the 1990s and early 2000s, which grapple with taboo themes of race, gender, sexuality and political change. His imaginative figurative style – with its precedents in medieval depictions of death, Christian iconography, and comic book exaggeration – was deeply rooted in Zulu folklore and Pentecostal influences. While he often employed allegory and fantasy to address societal issues, Makhoba also produced social-realist portrayals of rural
KwaZulu-Natal life, including scenes of cattle herding. Art historian Juliette Leeb-du Toit, who knew Makhoba, highlights his art’s connection to Zulu praise poetry (izibongo) and musical traditions like maskandi, which frequently reference cattle herding. A saxophonist, Makhoba led the band Trevor Makhoba and the Persuaders during the 1980s before finding acclaim as a painter in the 1990s.2
1. Colnect (n.d.) Stamp catalog, online, https://colnect.com/en/stamps/list/country/197-South_Africa/series/169741-Landscape_Paintings, 31
January 2025.
2. Juliette Leeb-du Toit (2005), ‘Phila Trevor Makhoba‘s Narratives and Mores: a Dialectics of Artistic and Intellectual Leadership’, in Trevor Makhoba Memorial Exhibition, Durban Art Gallery, page 37.
Mario Pissarra (2018) ASAI, Dogs on Duty: The unsettling aesthetic of Trevor Makhoba, online, https://asai.co.za/dogs-on-duty-trevor makhoba/, accessed 30 January 2025.
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