Artists

Paul du Toit was a Cape artist who worked in oil, acrylic, watercolour, and ink. He studied at the Hugo Naudé Art Centre in Worcester under the mentorship of Jean Welz, followed by a brief time at l’École des Beaux Arts in Paris. He spent time travelling around Europe and living in London before returning to the Cape. He participated in numerous international exhibitions, including the São Paulo Biennale in 1964. In South Africa he held a joint exhibition with Jean Welz in 1949 and participated in the 1964 Quadrennial Exhibition and the 1981 Republic Festival Exhibition. A retrospective exhibition of his work was shown at the Pretoria Art Museum in 1976, and he won a Medal of Honour from the Suid Afrikaanse Akadamie van Wetenskap en Kuns in 1984.

Themes in his painting and compositions, where he drew on the rhythms and movement of growing forms, were consistently based in nature. Du Toit’s early paintings displayed a strong linear quality. As his style developed, his works became more abstract and he reduced his interpretation of the landscape down to its essential elements. His paintings became more fragmented and dynamic, with his use of line developed to emphasise movement. His later works were evocative of the spirit of the landscape and his sense of the lyrical and mystical forces of nature.

Image courtesy H. J. Strydom.