Perspectives on Africa

Live Virtual Auction, 17 February 2025

Perspectives on Africa
About the Session

Strauss & Co is pleased to present Perspectives on Africa, a sale that explores the complexity, beauty, and fluidity of perspectives through African art and works by artists with strong ties to the continent. The sale coalesces the rich and varied connections between Africa and its artistic expressions, presenting works that span figuration, landscape, and abstraction, inviting collectors to engage with powerful narratives emerging from Africa's evolving perspectives. The works reflect layered meanings, both as a method  of representing depth and dimension as a way of framing our understanding of the world. Work by Contemporary artists reflects on the historical foundations of Modernist artists, exploring themes such as identity, belonging, urbanisation, and re-encounters with tradition, while the sale transitions to Modernist interpretations of Africa, exploring the complexity of colonial encounters, post-independence aspirations, and indigenous practices. Building on Strauss & Co’s commitment to developing a strong local photography market, the sale includes an artist focus on the work of social documentarian Paul Alberts, whose images captured poignant narratives of everyday life, particularly in Cape Town. These works sit alongside David Goldblatt and Zanele Muholi, whose visceral images explore themes of identity, social justice and the multifaceted realities of African life.


Sold for

ZAR 1 039 725
Lot 139
  • Jacob Hendrik Pierneef; Naby Thabazimbi (Near Thabazimbi), Rustenberg District
  • Jacob Hendrik Pierneef; Naby Thabazimbi (Near Thabazimbi), Rustenberg District
  • Jacob Hendrik Pierneef; Naby Thabazimbi (Near Thabazimbi), Rustenberg District


Lot Estimate
ZAR 1 000 000 - 1 500 000
Selling Price
Incl. Buyer's Premium & VAT
ZAR 1 039 725
Shipping
Condition Report
May include additional detailed images

About this Item

South African 1886-1957
Naby Thabazimbi (Near Thabazimbi), Rustenberg District

signed and dated 43; inscribed with the title on the stretcher

oil on canvas
39 by 54cm excluding frame; 65 by 80 by 4cm including frame

Notes

This painting beautifully showcases Jacob Hendrik Pierneef's ability to evoke quietude and wonder in his depictions of rural landscapes.
Painted in the artist's late fifties, it is a symphony of harmonious colours - rust reds, sun bleached yellows, dusty pinks - that conjure the stark yet luxuriant beauty of the southern Waterberg region, northwest of Pretoria. A site of continuous human habitation for millennia, Boer administrators once considered the region a forlorn outpost. Malaria and tsetse flies were commonplace, as were poverty and frugality. "Give him a farm in the Waterberg," Paul Kruger is reputed to have remarked of troublesome citizens.

View all Jacob Hendrik Pierneef lots for sale in this auction