Winners Circle
Judges
A special thank you to our judges.
Sasol and the Association of Arts would like to express their heartfelt gratitude to the Sasol New Signatures judges, both regionally and nationally, who give of their valuable time to evaluate and select the winners from the hundreds of entries received.
Thank you for your great contribution to the success of this magnificent exhibition.
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Merit Award
Zane Wesley Lange
Zane Wesley Lange was born on the 20th of January 1986 in Welkom in the Free State where he lived till the age of ten and thereafter relocated to Port Elizabeth.
Zane began his studies in Fine art at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University Department of Art and Design in 2005. Mr Lange majored in Fine art Sculpture and received his BTech degree in Fine art at the end of 2009. In his third year of study Zane was the recipient of the Graig Simon Memorial Award for the Best Third Year Sculpture Student of that year.
Mr Lange also actively takes part in art competitions on a regular basis. In 2009 and 2010 his artworks were selected as part of the top 100 finalist in the Sasol New Signatures Fine Art competition. His work “Joystick” of 2010 won a Merit award at the Sasol New Signatures Competition, as it was selected as part of the top ten best works. Mr Lange entered the ABSA L’Atelier – and Sasol New Signatures Art Competitions in 2012 and was selected again as part of the top 100 finalists for both competitions. Most recently Zane entered the Sasol New Signatures competition of 2014 and 2015 where all his entries formed part of the top 100 works.
Mr Lange currently lives and works in Port Elizabeth as an artist and small business owner.
Wood, screws and nails
190 cm X 62 cm X 26 cm
Reconstructed deconstruction; upon entering the synaptic cleft.
Merit Award
Shaun James Francis
Shaun James Francis is an artist/designer; he was born in Johannesburg on the 28th of March 1988. He completed his BA (Hons) in Information Design at the University of Pretoria in 2011. Shaun has been working as a graphic designer for the past 5 years (2012-2016), creating artwork for local & international brands such as Nando’s (Nando’s Art Initiative), FNB (Private Wealth), Nedbank, Centurion (American Express), Goldman Sachs, Anglo American, Exxaro, Transnet, Hollard, Tiger Brands, Prime Media, Glo (Nigeria), Cotlands, University of Johannesburg, Webber Wentzel, Comme des Garçons, L’Artisan Parfumeur & many more. If you go to the grocery store, a Nando’s restaurant, the bank, or the local mall, you will come into contact with something he has created.
He has received awards & recognition for his design work, but what Shaun is most passionate about is creating his personal art pieces, it is an outlet for how he feels & how he makes sense of the world around him. He has entered Sasol New Signatures, because art is what he loves and lives for. He sees the competition as a launching pad to furthering his career in the art world and allowing him to focus on what he loves the most. He was awarded the ‘Are You The Next Banksy Award’ from One Small Seed & Learning Curve in 2010 (illustration category), as well as receiving the ‘MTV Base Art Break Award’ in the same year. He was a Sasol New Signatures Finalist in both 2011 & 2013.
Ink printed onto Fabriano
Diptych: (2) 103 cm X 77,5 cm
Edition: 1/8
This artwork documents my life/my world over a period of two weeks. Each graphic and visual represents a feeling, an emotion, a sound, a thought, an idea, and an experience. The artwork has been constructed on a time-line going from left to right. Each A1 print (week 1 & week 2) has been divided into seven days consisting of two parts each. The notches/lines above the timeline on each work are indicative of 12-hour zones, thus creating 24 hours on each day.
Merit Award
Mosa Anita Kaiser
Currently doing a BA in Art History & Visual Culture, Art Studio Practice and Politics at the university currently known as Rhodes. Was born and raised in the Freestate. My idea of myself as an artist has always been unsteady. My work commonly deals with the personal and weaves it to connect to a broad range of ideas, questions and issues. Mostly questions.
Photographic prints
Triptych: 45 cm X 65 cm | 65 cm X 45 cm | 45 cm X 65 cm
This piece started with the idea that who you choose to photograph as a photographer, and how you choose to photograph them, reflects as much about you as it does about the sitter. I did a series of portraits with four young women of colour from a church I attend. I choose each women because I identified with each of them in various ways as young women of colour navigating their relationship with their spirituality. I brought my subjects into the studio and photographed them while having water poured on them capturing how each individual reacts to the water, communicating their various personalities. The water was used to signify the various metaphors of water with spirituality. The warm colours and tones where constructed to subvert the idea of waters typical attachment to blue and coolness and instead interpret it as more warm, vibrant and full of motion and life. The colour yellow is specifically significant of women deities. This trio of photos forms one part of a series.
Merit Award
Matilda Engelblik
I am Matilda Engelblik, originally from Klerksdorp in the North West Province. I am presently residing in Pretoria, Lydiana, from 2011 up until now. My artistic interest began as a child with frequent excursions to art dealers and having parents as art collectors. Currently, I have completed my BA (Fine Art) degree in 2015 at the University of Pretoria. Throughout my four years of study - being introduced to a variety of mediums and techniques - I have progressed and invested in my own discourse and medium. My body of work deals with the space specificity of loss and death, specializing in video and sculpture as medium. My art is characterized by its subtlety and narrative qualities. Existing mostly of questionnaires and text works that allow for interactivity between art and participator.
My artwork has been exhibited in group exhibitions with fellow students at the University of Pretoria. I was selected as a finalist in the Sasol New Signatures Art Competition (2015). Furthermore, I was a recipient of a Fine Art student bursary presented by the Department of Visual Arts (2015). Exhibitions include *imagetext* colloquium at the Department of Visual Arts’ (2015) at the Van Wouw House, Art Lovers’ 1932 Gallery (2013) and the Cool Capital Biennale (2014) as under the Cushion Collaboration and Reaction, Collaboration and Communication. I was also selected finalist at the National Experimental Film Festival (2013), as well as the Hello Ambassador Design Awards (2014). I have also participated in a commission-based project presented by Anglo Platinum –Kumba Iron Ore Mines in Thabazimbi, Limpopo Province (2012).
Pins, text, ceramics, blue and white thread, acetate, printing vinyl on canvas, amadeo steel rods, Perspex and wood 10 Part: 220 cm X 150 cm X 170 cm My body of work is based on memory and the spatiality of death and loss. I am obsessed with the absence brought about by the loss of an individual and their connectedness to a specific space. I use an archaeological-archival methodology to map the experience of bereavement. I thus focus on the theory of affect and space within my art practice. The artworks presented are sculptures and drawings made with ceramics, pins, thread, wood, and printed texts.
My work aims to portray the process of grieving in order to comprehend the personal loss that I have experienced. I create a space where viewers can reflect on their own experience of loss by capturing the presence of the deceased in a specific space. I aim to preserve the spatial experiences of the deceased as well as the bereaved, by collecting narratives. Through questionnaires and personal postcards of the bereaved, a detailed description of their presence, in the space where they were confronted with death, is provided. This project became a journey, pursuing the hope of understanding the human fate of death and loss. The thread becomes a metaphorical representation for the ephemerality of memory and the preservation of the specific space of loss. The text represents the deceased individual. As stated by Aleida Assmann (2012:22), ‘space bears memory “through the individual” that occupies it.’ RS Lazarus states, ‘… emotion [refers] to [a] transaction or interaction between a person and environment’ (in Robinson 2004:175-176). These maps are representations of the memories we obtain of those we have lost. My art thus aims to allow viewers to have an affective experience by allowing them to reflect on this space of loss. Through the creative process, I am excavating the location and dimensions of my own loss. In effect, I am carving a space for shared reflection on the impact of a life lost on those left behind and the memories we obtain of those who have departed.
Merit Award
Aneesa Loonat
Aneesa Loonat, born in 1984 in Port Elizabeth, is currently a student at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University currently completing her Btech in painting. She completed her diploma in Fine Art in 2015, graduating cum laude.
After completing her degree, she intends to do a residency outside of South Africa, to then return to her home country to pursue a career in Fine Arts as well as complete a Masters in Fine Art.
Installation: 81 cm X 127 cm X 56,6 cm
Like many South Africans, my primary mode of transport is walking and making use of public transport. Whilst walking to and from destinations I experience the world around me a lot more intimately than if I were just driving a car. Something that became apparent to me, while walking-common in different parts of Port Elizabeth-is money laying on the ground. Sometimes the coins are still in a condition to be used while others are so badly damaged that they just about represent an object that stands for our South African economy.
This absurdity led me to the act of collecting. As I walk, I stop and pick up money on an almost daily basis. My collection of this street money is what informed my art making.
These coins have been preserved in a full fuse glass process. In fusing the coins, different forms of value are added as well as removed. Aesthetic value is attained by these found objects being preserved in glass. The glass process results in a complete loss in economic value which can never be returned to it. In essence, this is an exaggeration of what we do with money as earners and spenders in South Africa. For many people, a great emphasis is placed on the chase for money, yet once attained this money is merely something to get rid of.
Runner Up
Paul Marais
Paul Marais, born in 1986, grew up in the small Western Cape town of Porterville, South Africa. He qualified and worked in the Information Technology sector before pursuing his studies in the Visual Arts. The worlds of cinema and music, as well as the urban landscape, are major contributors to the visual language that he employs. Drawing, painting, printmaking and the video medium are the primary means through which he explores personal narratives that ask existential questions. Marais is currently a third year Fine Art student at Stellenbosch University.
Digital video
201 seconds
Edition: 1/5
In this work, the constructed nature of culture and systems within society are of prime importance. The stop motion technique is employed in this piece to formulate a narrative that emphasises the constructed nature of the environment on display. Two-dimensional drawing elements, three-dimensional objects and sound recordings are combined to create a play between the fictional and the non-fictional and to challenge perception.
The post-apartheid South African landscape is still rife with discrimination, communication breakdowns and inequality. This piece aims to construct an allegory with the characters of the glove, the washing machine, the basin and socks in order to bring attention to the delicate situation the country finds itself in. The chalkboards in the background also have connotations to the educational system that sets the scene for this allegory. The glove, which is the antagonist in the piece, represents the systems and ideologies responsible for separating people from one another. The socks and the washing machine function in harmony if all parties involved are considered as ‘delicates’. Eventually, the intolerant glove destroys the entire environment when the rebellion of the other characters challenges it. This narrative thus offers both a warning and a hopeful message for a more sensitive and inclusive country.
Winner
Zyma Amien
I was born in Lansdowne in 1962. In 1980, I matriculated from Cathkin High School in Heideveld. After matric, I pursued a career in Medical Technology and graduated from Peninsula Technikon in Bellville in 1985, majoring in Blood Transfusion.
I further pursed a career in art and started my studies with the University of South Africa in 2008 and graduated in 2014. Furthermore, I enrolled at the University of Cape Town for a Masters degree. I graduated in 2015 with distinctions, for the work titled, Real lives and ordinary objects: Partisan strategies of art-making with the garment workers of the Western Cape.
In 2012, I won the Pretoria Portland Cement competition for my work titled, The day they came for our house.
In 2013 I was a finalist in the Sasol New Signature.
Mixed media
Installation: 250 cm X 250 cm X 40 cm
This artwork addresses labour issues, particularly within the garment and textile industry. It is a reaction to my mother and grandmother who worked and continues to work, in this trade. This work references the lack of recognition, exploitation as well as mental and physical trauma they endured. With this installation, I aim to honour these workers and pay homage to them.
I created overalls, an outer garment worn by workers (these are worn by female workers), using gauze. Gauze, usually used for wounds and scars, was used to allude to historical, physical and structural pain. Pins were used to hold the side seams together which is a metaphor for the manner in which the machinists have been pinned to their seats and sewing machine as machinists. My mother worked as a machinist for more than 50 years.
This installation consists of 3 X 5 metre long overalls made out of cream coloured gauze. The overalls are placed above eyelevel, thus elevating the worker, while the balance of the fabric is rolled up. A sewing machine is placed on top of the fold thus restraining the worker.
The word Homage is synonymous with recognition, honour, tribute and acknowledgement – all emotions I experience in relation to the garment workers, while Pay refers to the minimum wage these workers earn. Currently they are earning R788 per week.
