Witness: Midbrain

Notes

In 1991, Deborah Bell made an etching inspired by Las Meninas, a 1656 painting by Diego Velázquez of the 5-year-old Spanish Infanta, Margaret Theresa. She titled it We Will Never Know What We Are and hung it in her guest bathroom. In the early 2010s, William Kentridge saw the work and encouraged her to revisit the theme. Shortly after, she found herself at the Picasso Museum in Spain in front of Picasso's own renditions on the original. Bell made several quick sketches in her notebook and, upon reviewing them, noticed that in one she had turned the figure in the doorway into one with wings. She embraced this new imagery and began creating works with the 1991 etching as a source. One such work was a dry point etching, Reveal (2014), which served as the precursor to the present lot. Bell explains that she sees the spaces in these works as "…the space of the brain… the paintings on the walls can be seen as memories, both cultural or personal…looking at the past, at something known or accomplished, or they can stand for a new idea, or a reworking for change."¹

^1. Deborah Bell (2015) Deborah Bell: Dreams of Immortality, Johannesburg: Everard Read, page 52.

Provenance

Everard Read, Cape Town, 14 July 2015.

The Oliver Powell and Timely Investments Trust Collection.

Exhibited

Everard Read, Deborah Bell: Dreams of Immortality, 7 May to 27 June 2015, Johannesburg and 14 May to 7 June, Cape Town, illustrated in the exhibition catalogue on page 61.