roadtrip – hannalie taute

When I arrived in Cape Town on Friday the 17th I was greeted by a very friendly butler, named Lizo, at the Old Foundry Hotel, where I spent one evening.

Then on Friday Night (the actual reason for my trip to Cape Town) was to meet up with Michelle Paterson (Director of MContemporary gallery)

, Louise Rush (the manager of the gallery)

as well as a couple of their collectors, especially Paul and Dimi Korkidas, from Australia, for dinner at Thali – a contemporary Indian Restaurant in Cape Town.

It was truly a wonderful experience. One I will never forget.

The next day I spent 5 hours at the Cape Town Art Fair

Apart form the sensory overload, it was great to bump into fellow artists like Elske Henderson:

It was also insightful to do the walkabout with curator Sean O’ Toole who talked about his curated solo booths project at the fair.

It was interesting to hear him commenting that artists-‘friends’ for eg: Jeanne Gaigher who was accepted and despite their age, Gerhard Marx as well as Joachim Schonfeld were accepted- as if age should matter. And he also mentioned the ‘art world politics’ where Marx left Goodman for Everard read, etc…..So afterwards I cornered Sean and asked him if my work was not accepted because I am too old, or not his friend, or not with the ‘right’ gallery or is it my work that was not strong enough?

I probaby caught him by surprise, but as a critic I feel that he should be able to handle a straight forward question. His answer was that he was not responsible for the selection, but that the “Art Fair People” chose the 10 galleries that he had to work with. mmmm…..

Anyway,

Up next was a visit with some family members. Here I am with my belated mom’s eldest brother and his wife (Fanie & Annatjie Kruis), whom I haven’t seen since my mom’s passing more than 20 years ago.

As well as my cousin Stephan Kruis:

Then on Sunday I spent some time with an old school friend (Jeanine Kotze) and her family in Stellenbosch. They took me around town and we had a wonderful time catching up.

Unfortunately I left Stellenbosch the next day with a tummy bug, but are on my way to recovery. Looking forward to get back into the studio.

xxxx

A BIG thank you to everyone who came to the opening night of my solo exhibition: Implanted Memories at Knysna Fine Art gallery on the 8th of December!

My excitement for that evening started in November already when me and my friend Anli bombarded Santa at the Pre-Primary school Christmas concert. We pretended to ask Mr Clause for a mom’s-day-off aka roadtrip while the dad’s hold the fort for awhile – and guess what: wish granted!

So on our way we stopped in George at my favourite bookshop: The Blue Forest Bookshop

I always love their window displays, its just a pity I suck at taking a good photo of it 😉

and I also visited one of my favourite companies to pick up some extra ‘art’ supplies (read inner tubes).

A couple of hours we finally made it to Knysna!

Anli and Myself all dressed up and ready for the evening.

I decided that I wanted to wear a ‘hat’ for the occasion and made it from the inner of an army helmet, which I drilled holes into and put pieces of tule into it.

photographer: Philip Heijnen

Philip (staff member of the gallery) also organised a smoke machine for the evening. Smoke machines remind me of my student years, and I like the idea of a smokescreen as a ‘implanted memory’ and always dreamt of having one at an exhibition. Since the gallery is really big, and a couple of solo shows opened on that same night AND the smoke didn’t really behave like we wanted to so we removed it later, but at least he took a photograph to capture the memory.

Talking about ‘student years’…it was amazing to see one of my lecturers at the gallery: Charmaine Haines:

Charmaine and her husband Martin Haines were having their exhibition titled: the Owl and the Pussy cat on that same evening. How awesome is that!

During the evening I planted a memory (read attach a rubber flower shaped brooch) on everyone I interacted with

What a memorable evening indeed. It’s just a pity that we didn’t get a group photo with all the exhibiting artists and all the staff members including the owner Trent Read, but here are some more memorable moments:

from left to right: Paula Louw (artist), Philip Heijnen (staff member) Mylene Ife (Gallery Manager), Yours truly and Alta Grobler (Staff member)

It was also Artist Paula Louw’s birthday that evening!

Jaycene (staff member at Knysna Fine Art)

And in a flash it all came to an end, but remember if you are in the area, the exhibition will be up for approximately a month! Or you can visit their website for more info on all the exhibitions currently on show – click here