/ CURRENT Exhibitions

North Gallery

Majak Bredell: The New York Years - 1981 - 2003
6 March to 25 March 2020

Walkabout: Wednesday 11 March 2020 at 12h00

When Majak Bredell emigrated to New York in 1981 she embarked on a journey that would lead her to the riches this world-city had to offer a searching artist.

The Association of Arts Pretoria in conjunction with the Pretoria Art Museum will be mounting extensive retrospective exhibitions – Majak Bredell: The New York Years 1981 – 2003, curated by Professor Elfriede Dreyer. The works on exhibition at both venues cover a period a period of 22 years that follow the trajectory of the artist’s initial confrontations with issues of belonging and being an outsider as the chasm between her mother country and her adopted home were mediated in both image and poetry.

Since her return to South Africa, themes developed in New York were further elaborated and exhibited: 2009 - Alter Images: The Black Madonna & Sisters; 2013 - Roll Call; 2016 - Codex Magdalene. Her current works in progress, Earth/Body, centre round dialogues between the human body and the body of the earth.

The comprehensive exhibition will be opened by Prof Elfriede Dreyer at 11h00 on Saturday 14 March 2020 at the Pretoria Art Museum, corner of Francis Baard and Wessels Streets, Arcadia Park, Pretoria and can be seen until Sunday 14 June 2020.

Artist’s statement:

Through art-making I quarrelled with the legacy and unyielding demands of the patriarchal Calvinism that shaped my childhood in the 1950s. This journey, accompanied by Jungian therapy and much reading, eventually led me to a gender shift in the image of the sacred, culminating in my resurrection of ancient notions of the great mother; goddess; sacred female. In this process, I imagined an embodied reflection of those parts of being that had been marginalized or rejected by western monotheism’s misogyny and its casting of the sexual female body into the abyss of so-called original sin… I returned to South Africa after a hiatus of almost 23 years. I bear a double identity.

Main Gallery

Majak Bredell: The New York Years 1981 - 2003
6 March 2020 to 25 March 2020

Walkabout: Wednesday 11 March 2020 at 12h00

When Majak Bredell emigrated to New York in 1981 she embarked on a journey that would lead her to the riches this world-city had to offer a searching artist.

The Association of Arts Pretoria in conjunction with the Pretoria Art Museum will be mounting extensive retrospective exhibitions – Majak Bredell: The New York Years 1981 – 2003, curated by Professor Elfriede Dreyer. The works on exhibition at both venues cover a period a period of 22 years that follow the trajectory of the artist’s initial confrontations with issues of belonging and being an outsider as the chasm between her mother country and her adopted home were mediated in both image and poetry.

Since her return to South Africa, themes developed in New York were further elaborated and exhibited: 2009 - Alter Images: The Black Madonna & Sisters; 2013 - Roll Call; 2016 - Codex Magdalene. Her current works in progress, Earth/Body, centre round dialogues between the human body and the body of the earth.

The comprehensive exhibition will be opened by Prof Elfriede Dreyer at 11h00 on Saturday 14 March 2020 at the Pretoria Art Museum, corner of Francis Baard and Wessels Streets, Arcadia Park, Pretoria and can be seen until Sunday 14 June 2020.

Artist’s statement:

Through art-making I quarrelled with the legacy and unyielding demands of the patriarchal Calvinism that shaped my childhood in the 1950s. This journey, accompanied by Jungian therapy and much reading, eventually led me to a gender shift in the image of the sacred, culminating in my resurrection of ancient notions of the great mother; goddess; sacred female. In this process, I imagined an embodied reflection of those parts of being that had been marginalized or rejected by western monotheism’s misogyny and its casting of the sexual female body into the abyss of so-called original sin… I returned to South Africa after a hiatus of almost 23 years. I bear a double identity.

Gallery Chaton

Minette van Rooyen - Doodles de lux
1 March 2020 to 18 March 2020

Minette van Rooyen has become a household name in our art circles. She is known and admired for her masterly drawings, exquisite water colour paintings and beautiful ceramic works.

Minette’s works bear testimony of her love to travel to far countries and distant places and her excitement to look at landscapes, architectural scenes and still lives, always with impeccable style, graceful lines and a sure knowledge and understanding of her media. It is no wonder that over all these years as an art teacher, she has inspired and encouraged so many artists.

‘Doodle’ refers to absent-mindedly scribbling. This is not the case with Minette – her pictorial meanderings enter the unknown realm of inner meditation and capture an exquisite world of amazement.