Artist Database

Frustrated by the conservative doctrine of Edward Roworth at the Michaelis School of Art in Cape Town, Eugene Labuschagne moved to Paris in 1947 and focused on developing a Cubist aesthetic. The artist and his wife rented a small room on the Île de Saint Louis, where they welcomed Gerard Sekoto on his arrival in Paris. The two like-minded artists had met previously in Cape Town. Labuschagne’s early experiments in Paris were well-received, and he exhibited at the Salon de Mai in 1950 and the following year at the Genoa Biennale alongside the likes of Picasso, Leger and Rouault. He settled back in South Africa in 1951, continuing his remarkable abstract trials on his farm in the Piet Retief area.