The Engen Collection
Live Virtual Auction, 24 June 2025
The Engen Collection
About the SessionThe Engen Collection is a corporate collection that highlights a crucial chapter in South African art history.
Initially put together as the Mobil collection in the early 1980s, it brings to market a selection of works from a broader archive of over two hundred artworks, offering insights into the networks, pedagogies and creative resistances that shaped South African abstract art in the early 1980s. It comprises of paintings, tapestries, works on paper and photographs representing a significant corporate investment in South African contemporary art during a period of intense cultural and political transformation. The collection engages with a moment when South African artists were developing visual languages that could operate across the cultural and artistic boundaries. These artists, including Bill Ainslie, Simon Stone, Gabriel Tsolo, Judith Mason, Andrew Verster, Pippa Skotnes and Gail Altschuler, documented individual artistic development alongside the collective creation of alternative artistic practice.
The collection traces the intellectual and artistic genealogy of artists working within and against the constraints of the 80s, many of whom were influenced by the South African artist, teacher and activist Bill Ainslie and the Johannesburg Art Foundation (JAF), an institution that maintained inclusivity. Founded in 1982, JAF operated as an educational anomaly, rejecting prescribed curricula and external authority in favour of emancipatory and experimental pedagogy. Under Ainslie's direction, the Foundation fostered abstract expressionism, an art movement whose rejection of traditional representational art prioritised non-objective imagery to evoke emotion. The connections of the institution extended beyond the JAF itself, linking to the establishment of Federated Union of Black Artists (FUBA) and the Thupelo Workshops in Cape Town, institutions whose impact continues to shape contemporary South African art discourse.
The CEO, Mr George Roberts, said: "The Engen Collection represents a broad and vibrant range of South African artists and has been a treasured part of our company’s story for many years. As we look to the future, we believe it is time for these remarkable artworks to find new homes where they can continue to be appreciated, shared and celebrated. We believe that by releasing this collection, the artworks will find new life amongst a wider community, while inspiring new audiences by continuing to tell the story of South Africa’s creative spirit."
About this Item
signed, dated 1982 and numbered 4/16 in pencil in the margin
Notes
Pippa Skotnes was born in Johannesburg. She was educated at the University of Cape Town, where she received Master of Fine Art and Doctor of Literature degrees. After she was sued by the South African Library for a copy of her artist's book about Lucy Lloyd and the |xam, Sound from the Thinking Strings, she became deeply interested in the nature of the book, producing several volumes inscribed on the bones of horses, leopards, and blue cranes. The exhibitions Lamb of God and the Book of Iterations (2001-2011), which have been exhibited in South Africa, Europe, and the United States of America, followed. Skotnes has produced many publications over her career, including, Claim to the Country (Jacana, 2007), Unconquerable Spirit (Jacana, 2008), and Book of Iterations (Axeage Press, 2009).
She is the founding director of the Centre for Curating the Archive at the University of Cape Town and has been actively involved in the digitisation and curation of significant archival collections, including the Katrine Harries Print Cabinet and the print archive of Cecil Skotnes. Her work on the Skotnes archive culminated in the exhibition Cecil Skotnes: A Private View, co-curated with Thomas Cartwright, which was shown at both the South African National Gallery and the Standard Bank Gallery in Johannesburg in 2008.
Provenance
The Engen Collection.
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