Notes

1965 marks the beginning of what Esmé Berman has referred to as Alexis Preller’s Gold Period,¹ which gave rise to a series of god-kings with their jewel-like colours and to an increasing abstraction of forms. His travels to Italy, where he studied frescoes in Florence and Arezzo, and to Egypt, stimulated him to explore a new symbolic language which he synthesised with African-inspired forms and colours. The cross and star patterns on the gold neckpiece derive from sources like Dogon sculpture while the circles such as those found in East African kikoi cloths are described by Karel Nel as ‘a kind of power symbol’.² The face, with its bejewelled temples, is marked with scarification that is associated with beauty and elevated social status. Rendered in contrasting black and intense orange, it suggests multiple ways of being in the world.

1. Berman, Esmé. (1983) Art and Artists of South Africa, Cape Town and Rotterdam: A A Balkema. Page 350.
2. Berman, Esmé and Nel, Karel. (2009) Alexis Preller: Collected Images, Saxonwold: Shelf. Page 213.

Provenance

The Alexis Preller and Guna Massyn Collections, Volks Auctioneers, Pretoria, 18 November, 1977, lot 85