Provenance

Die Kunskamer, Cape Town, 2016.

Private Collection.

Notes

While many of Skotnes’s art influences were international, the focus and inspiration to his work was rooted in Africa. His distinctive image-making and pictorial narratives were strongly informed by African sculpture, and artefacts. His palette and compositions, graphically rendered in powerful colour and monumental forms were a response to the environment. Through incised carving, the artist scarified the surfaces, mapping it with mystery and meaning. These scarified and weathered surfaces suggest ritual and tradition, and the patinated bronze surrounds speak to the passage of time. The present lot carries an archetypal motif, expressed through stylised facial and physical forms, and conjured into existence, through the vision and expressive passion of the artist. Skotnes rose to prominence through his mythologised narratives of historical subjects ranging from Shaka Zulu to Wolraad Woltemade. The depth of his visual literacy served him as educator and mentor to so many outstanding artists of The Polly Street school, in optimising the uniqueness of their creative visions.