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A rare treat. The opportunity
to bare witness to one of the most inspirational black
artists in South Africa today. Not only a great communicator
and artist but also an incredibly versatile musician.
Garth Erasmus is one top quality guy!
Garth appeared totally
unfazed as seven teachers descended on his workshop
laden with video cameras and sound recording equipment.
In the true South African style Garth welcomed us into
his house and spoke with great eloquence about his work
and gave us a magical performance on his didgery doo.
Up until 1985-6, Garth
had considered himself to be a serious artist. He presented
himself to the world as an artist but at that time in
South Africa he found it difficult as a black artist
to get his work recognised and seen in commercial establishments.
He found himself looking into alternative ways to put
his ideas across.
Garth found inspiration
in working with waste materials from dumping sites.
His sculptures utilised old tin cans and metal drums
and the resultant sculptures were turned into sound
objects. Garth became absorbed in the percussive sounds
which these objects made and decided to look more widely
into ethnic instruments from around the world. He made
a collection of instruments using bamboo, PVC pipes
and gourds. Whilst demonstrating the bushman's bow which
he made 10 years ago the room was filled with the most
beautiful resonating sound. Eventually Garth began to
make flutes and later he discovered the didgery doo
and the mastered the circular breathing technique.
Being the son of two school
teachers, Garth had a privileged upbringing with educational
resources at hand and a vision for the future. Art education
in South Africa didn t exist as an option for Garth
until he was of the age to go to teacher training college
in Port Elizabeth. This was seen to be an escape route
for many. Entry into university required a permit as
universities were white institutions at that time. Garth
transferred to Cape Town for his second year as Port
Elizabeth did not have an Art department.
Garth received a traditional
art education which he could appreciate at the time
although he felt the subject matter was very tame. There
was no room for his work to have any social or political
comment which frustrated him.
In 1976 on his 21st birthday
he was given his first painting set by his parents.
This experience opened his eyes to a world of colour.
It was during this time that the 1976 uprising was taking
place and Garth decided that he could spread a message
through his work.
"I
asked myself the question, how can I be relevant in
that situation because it was all a very heated time.
It was a time of awareness and so I decided quite
consciously
to dedicate myself to my art, my painting, my work,
my talents to that struggle to uplift my community
and
that's how it all started for me"
Garth's paintings from
this point carried a strong message. They were not paintings
to beautify. Graffiti work was very much central to
his style.
From 1977 to 1980 Garth
moved to Rhodes University in Grahamstown where he was
exposed to a more serious level of Art making. Garth
was trying to deal with freedom in his work which has
been bound up for some time. He was involved in a group
called Vacalisa which was a group of visual artists,
painters and poets whose ideal was to express themselves
freely.
Garth's art work was made
to be seen in the community it was not important that
it should survive the gallery system. Templates were
made of the faces of victims of the South African police
raids and their images with slogans were sprayed in
public places. Garth took these templates back to his
studio and produced some hard hitting paintings based
on the atrocious incidents which were witnessed on an
all too frequent basis. He also used the image of Nelson
Mandela who was fast becoming an icon and used the slogan
Free Nelson Mandela.
A visit to the Tupello
workshop in Johannesburg some years later gave Garth
s work another change of direction as he was introduced
to a new freer approach to painting with the guidance
of Bill Ainsley. He became more interested in the abstract
qualities of colour. The paintings came about as a result
of a very heightened emotional anger. Garth still claims
to be living off the inspiration of the Tupello workshops
right now.
His current work is not
so politically blatant and uses abstract imagery taken
from Bushman art and Ethnic art.
"I
had a sense of how Western art history was developed
and how Picasso and others had been influenced by
African
and third world art and I realised that being African
I am part of the whole thing."
Our meeting with Garth
Erasmus was very special and I know that I will never
forget the experience of sharing in his views and experiences
of apartheid South Africa.
Read
the Interview
Katie Helliwell
