Twin Peaks, Jonkershoek

Notes

Executed in the 1920s, at the dawn of what Esmé Berman and P G Nel describe as the artist's celebrated period of 'discovery and mastery', this work is a magnificent precursor to Pierneef’s famous 1932 Johannesburg Station panel of Stellenbosch. Though his family briefly settled in the Netherlands during the Anglo-Boer War, Pierneef’s first professional European tour occurred in 1925. This exposure to international modernism, specifically the geometric theories of Willem van Konijnenburg, profoundly influenced his style.

While it is unclear if this jewel-like piece was painted immediately before or after his 1925 trip, it brilliantly balances linear clarity with an endearing depiction of a vernacular homestead nestled amongst ordered gardens. Pierneef first visited and painted the Jonkershoek range in 1921, and the subject remained an iconic motif throughout his career. Although many of his early treatments of this view were impressionistic, the present lot is a rare, completed version executed in casein. Casein is an ancient, water-based, and opaque medium using a binder derived from milk protein, which produces a durable, matte, pearly, and fast-drying finish. This work is similar to a depiction of the same subject sold in 2018 for R 512 100 in Strauss & Co’s Cape Town saleroom. However, that larger work, executed in watercolours and charcoal, carried the tone of a study. In contrast, the present lot offers a richer, more high-quality finish. Rare in quality and scale, this painting is a masterful arrangement of mauve, violet, and electric pink fragments.

The work is distinguished by its subtle colour variety and the angular, fragmented elements found in both the Cape Dutch architecture and the peaks behind. Pierneef’s typical palette of lavenders, purples, and greens is complemented here by candy-coloured oranges and reds on the canopied roof. The interlocking clouds further suggest an architectonic sensibility, mirroring the decorative quality he saw in the mountain peaks.

A master printmaker, Pierneef infused his milestone paintings with a controlled graphic element. The angular, carved lines of the Twin Peaks bear a striking resemblance to a number of his celebrated linocuts.

Works of this quality are few and far between, and a more dramatic, spine-tingling combination could not have been locked together more beautifully.

Esmé Berman (1996) Art and Artists of South Africa, Johannesburg: South Book, pages 327-334.

P G Nel (ed) (1990) J H Pierneef: His Life and His Work, Cape Town and Johannesburg: Perskor.