Provenance

Strauss & Co, Cape Town, 11 October 2010, lot 147.

Notes

Jacob Hendrik Pierneef first visited Stellenbosch in 1921, producing a number of plein-air paintings of its vineyards and mountains, notably the majestic Jonkershoek Mountains. He exhibited these works to great local acclaim at Die Uitspan. Buoyed by this success, Pierneef returned to Stellenbosch throughout his life to work and socialise. Much like Rustenburg Kloof, the Jonkershoek Mountains, with their twin peaks, emerged as a favourite subject: a place of natural splendour and permanence that enabled him to test ideas and push new lines of pictorial enquiry.

Stylistic innovation was a hallmark of Pierneef’s practice, though not always in a coherent or linear manner, making the periodisation of undated works particularly challenging. It is likely that this undated work dates from the late 1920s, following his second visit to Europe in 1925 – an experience that transformed his approach to compositional design, liberated his colour palette, and reawakened his avant-garde streak.¹

Shunning the awed naturalism of his earlier works, Pierneef now favoured simplified forms, flattened perspectives and expressionistic colours. This new modern style, which he continued to wrestle with over the ensuing decades, was more decorative and graphic. As is evident in this assured work, with its gently cubistic flourishes and exaggerated palette of blues, purples and shades of burgundy, Pierneef never allowed his fascination with Stellenbosch and its mountains to descend into caricature. His awe and wonder at the natural world was a constant.

¹ Alastair Meredith (2022) J H Pierneef: En Route – Five Decades of Travel, Johannesburg: Strauss & Co, page 31.