Webinar | Irma Stern: Key International Modernist

Discover the true modernist identity of Irma Stern, South Africa’s top-selling artist, as we re-examine her output following the landmark Brücke-Museum exhibition: “Irma Stern. A Modern Artist between Berlin and Cape Town” and her latest 2024 Venice Biennale inclusion. The discussion will unpack how Stern was a pivotal figure in German Expressionism and a key international modernist. The focus will delve into her formative Berlin years, exploring her crucial ties to the Novembergruppe and friendship with Brücke artist Max Pechstein, and how this established the bold style she brought to the Cape. The webinar will include an exclusive look at Prof Michael Godby’s latest research on Stern’s Still Lifes.

Speakers: Dr Lisa Hörstmann, Prof Michael Godby. Facilitated by Dr Alastair Meredith.

Speakers

Dr Lisa Hörstmann is curator and publications manager at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart in Berlin, Germany. She completed a PhD at the Department for African Art at Freie Universität Berlin with a thesis on South African settler primitivism. She is the co-curator of an exhibition on South African modernist Irma Stern that is currently on show at the Brücke-Museum in Berlin.

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Dr Alastair Meredith (b.1984, Johannesburg) is a passionate auctioneer with extensive scholarly knowledge of earlier twentieth-century South African paintings. A seasoned auctioneer, he has handled numerous white-glove sales and in 2025 calmly oversaw the world-record sale of a painting by Vladimir Tretchikoff at a live auction in Johannesburg. Alastair is passionate about making art history tangible to new audiences. He has overseen numerous initiatives aimed at drawing attention to important modernist artists and stylistic movements from the twentieth century. He has spearheaded successful single-artist sales and exhibitions devoted to John Muafangejo (2021), JH Pierneef (2021 & 2022 & 2023) and Clément Sénèque (2022), among many. An excellent communicator with a solid grasp of art history, he has delivered fascinating public lectures on modern and contemporary artists like Alexis Preller and William Kentridge to rapt audiences in Cape Town, Johannesburg and London.

After completing his Bachelor of Arts (Art History and English Literature) at the University of Edinburgh, Alastair attended Cambridge University where he completed both his Master’s and Doctoral degrees. It was his PhD research into the life and work of the Cape Town-born painter Jan Juta, also an accomplished muralist and designer, that first brought Alastair to the attention of Stephan Welz, Strauss & Co’s late Managing Director. An effective leader with brilliant inter-personal skills, he has headed up the art department since 2017.

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Prof Michael Godby is Emeritus Professor of History of Art at the University of Cape Town. He has published and lectured on Early Renaissance Art, English Eighteenth-century Art, particularly William Hogarth, Nineteenth- and Twentieth-century South African Art, and the History of South African Photography. Professor Godby has curated several exhibitions on South African art, notably Is there Still Life? Continuity and Change in South African Still Life Painting (2007) and The Lie of the Land: Representations of the South African Landscape (2010). He is currently preparing a collection of papers for a book on the History of photography in South Africa; and is planning a new exhibition on the theme of the Interior in European and South African Painting.