Notes

Andrea Lewis comments on this image of two Cape Malay women sewing, “The tonal contrast of pink, red and orange saturate this image with femininity and softness. They capture the vitality of the fabrics that the women wore […] Colour impacted profoundly on Stern. Driven by the intensity of her feelings, her works reveal her appreciation of the subtle nuances that she found around her. She uncovered colours that were specific to individual settings – from the vibrancy of Madeira to the earth colours of the Natal landscape; from the eastern influences of Dakar to the rose colours of Malay women.”

Andrea Lewis, page 33.

Provenance

The Irma Stern Trust Collection, accession number 811.

Literature

Andrea Lewis (2006) Journeys to the Interior, Unseen Works by Irma Stern 1929-1939, Cape Town: Kaplan Kushlick Foundation, illustrated in colour on page 76, with the title Two Seamstresses.