EXHIBITION - PE. Portraits and Environment

Exhibition: PE – Portraits and Environment

ART Gallery will be hosting an exhibition of work by two highly accomplished fine artists that have made their mark on a national level.

MJ Lourens was born (1973) in Pretoria and now lives in Cape Town. Lourens has exhibited extensively in South Africa and this will be his first exhibition in Port Elizabeth. Lourens's evocative paintings of the Bay and Port Elizabeth are at once familiar and strangely foreboding. Suffused with the quality of light at dusk, the landscapes are permeated by stillness, devoid of human drama. They speak of absence and emptiness, of isolation and alienation. Yet the distance affected by the panoramic viewpoints and the fading light is simultaneously disrupted by evidence of human intervention – festive lights on Marine Drive that cut across the view towards PE harbour.

Jaco Benade was born (1964) in Olifantshoek. Benade studied architecture at the University of the Orange Free State (1983-1985) as well as Graphic Design (1988-1991) and Fine Arts (1992-1994) at the Technikon Pretoria. Benade now lives and works in Port Elizabeth. His three genres of oil painting: portraiture, still life and landscape are monochromatic and hint at nostalgia and romanticism – a feeling that reflects a bygone era.
Both artists have won the SASOL New Signatures Art Competition (Benade 1994 and Lourens 1995) and are represented in numerous corporate collections such as Telkom SA, Unisa, Sanlam, RMB and ABSA group.

For further information kindly contact Anthony Harris at ART Gallery:
C: 072 379 5933
E: art.events@telkomsa.net