Gallery 2 presents The Sum of Unsettled Surfaces, a two a person show by Kyra Papé and Ross Passmoor. This show brings together the work of two artists whose work is rooted in the materials of everyday life. While each artist’s approach differs there is a commonality in their material explorations. Papé is an abstract artist working with fluid mediums in order to explore form and the disruption there of. With her primary interest being in the boundaries or nonboundaries that are being pushed, destabilised or contained via her works and the materials, her practice is a response to her personal physical material experiences. She works in various materials, one significantly being melted sugar, as a result of the physical behaviour of the material in relation to a personal severe allergy. She attempts through her manipulation of the sugar to gain control over a material which leaves her body vulnerable and helpless. However, the sugars ever-changing unstable state continuously pushes back. Papé’s material explorations include polyurethane foam, an acrylic medium and various inks. Each material explores viscerally potent manifestations where the appearance and texture of the material plays in the realm of amorphous masses and the internal body; leaving a fleshy corpulent alien image on the surface or in the sculptural form itself. Her process of making is obsessive and meticulous, indicative of her bodily frustrations. Although the abstract masses tend to carry a sense of delicacy, familiarity and organic fluidity, they remain foreign and shapeless, keeping the work in a contradictory state. Each material she explores engages with ideas around the natural disruption of the material and the surface. Passmoor works with found materials and incorporates them in his sculpture and printmaking practice. Specifically at this time he is using the waste from his suburban home, the garden refuse, lawn cuttings as well as house hold waste like plastic and cardboard. The work forms a palimpsest of suburban moments. Passmoor layers the material in both his sculptures and images in order to build a new arrangement of material, to give the thrown away material a new life.By working with the waste of his suburban home, his practice imbues the material with a kind of historicity, a new interpretation of what that material is. While their process and intentions differ a commonalty comes through in how both artists use sculpture as an outlet in their process. Incorporating sculpture in the cyclical nature of their practice. While the majority of the work is two dimensional, the relationship between the images and the sculptural work is clear, as both Papé and Passmoor take cues from their sculptural practice and apply them in their image making. Passmoor’s suburban detritus and Papé’s use of sugar are rooted in their lived experience. Working with the commonly found materials that they choose to, Papé and Passmoor explore and expand the possibilities of their material. They give the material a new life in their work. This reworking of everyday materials gives rise to a new way of seeing and engaging with these materials. As their work is process driven, they allow the materials they work with to drive the direction of their pieces. Papé’s work uses the ooze and flow of sugar and other liquid mediums. All her mediums being unstable and difficult to control force her to work with the materials natural behaviour rather than to manipulate the material itself. Passmoor uses the printmaking process to allow for layered marks to develop over time, responding to each layer in turn. Both bodies of work manipulate the surface of the paper and sculptures, through various marks, coverings and poured elements. The result is a rich textured surface which is never fully resolved. Marks blend into one another, layers fuse together and the artists continually push and pull visual elements. The constantly in flux, unsettled nature of the surfaces lends itself to ideas of disruption, transmutation and visual fluidity. While their work shares many notable similarities in how they work with sculpture and how they use commonly found and cheap materials, their practice diverges in terms of how marks are put down on paper. Papé’s method is meditative, slow and the image develops across the page with the artist allowing the work to unfold mark by mark. Passmoor’s approach uses relatively few mark making moments, perhaps four or five choices per work, allowing each layer to inform the next. What emerges from the coming together of these two practices is a body of work that is layered, therapeutic, open to exploration and interpretation, yet personal in that their material choices are linked closely to their lived experience.
Kyra SimonĂŠ PapĂŠ a young South African artist, born in 1993, and raised in Johannesburg focuses her practice on drawing, sculpture and printmaking. She is an abstract artist with a particular interest in materiality.
She has her Master of Arts in Fine Arts by Research (2018) as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Fine arts Degree from the University of Witwatersrand (2015).
As the Robert Hodgins award winner (2014) she went on to jointly achieve the Top Achievers award in the Fourth Year Fine Arts Department at the University of Witwatersrand (2015). She was a sculpture finalist in the PPC Imaginarium awards (2016) as well as being nominated by Artist Press for the Queen Sonja Print Award (2017). Her sculpture was selected for the top 100 in the Absa Atelier, Give Art Light Exhibition (2018).
In 2019 her work, Average (11.9 | 6), was purchased for the Modern Arts Projects collection. Later that year she went on a six week residency with SAFFCA at Entabeni Farm in Knysna with artist Fatima Tayob Moosa.
Throughout her studies and practice as an artist, she has participated in numerous group exhibitions and had a Solo Exhibition, Transude, in completion of her Master in Art, Fine Art degree at The Point of Order (March 2018).
Ross Passmoor a sculptor, print maker and painter primarily works from his studio in Johannesburg South Africa, lecturing part time. Passmoor born in Durban (1984) and raised in Pietermaritzburg obtained his Masters in Fine Art at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He taught art at St. Benedict High School in Pinetown for two years before deciding to practise art full time.
Passmoor moved to Johannesburg in 2012, where he currently lives, to pursue his career as an artist further. He had a residency at Assemblage’s NewARC studios as well as at the Bag Factory Studios, as a David Koloane Award winner. Passmoor while continuing with his practice is currently completing a PhD at Wits School of Art.
He has shown work at numerous fairs and gallery’s including: Turbine Hall Art Fair, FNB Joburg Art Fair, Gallery 2, Lizamore and Associates, Washington Print Gallery, Bayliss Gallery, KZNSA, Wits Art Museum and others. He has also been a finalist in multiple competitions including; Sasol New Signatures, Absa Atelier, Nivea Art Awards, the SA Taxi Art Awards and he previously was awarded the David Koloane Award.
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral XXXL01, Ink and acrylic medium on fabriano, 100 x 210cm, 2019
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral S02, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 26.3 x 26cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ and Ross Passmoor, Disrupted M03, Relief Embossing with archival ink on paper, 35.5 X 50cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ and Ross Passmoor, Disrupted M04, Relief Embossing with archival ink on paper, 35.5 X 50cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ and Ross Passmoor, Disrupted M05, Relief Embossing with archival ink on paper, 35.5 X 50cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ and Ross Passmoor, Disrupted M06, Relief Embossing with archival ink on paper, 50 x 35.5cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ and Ross Passmoor, Disrupted M07, Relief Embossing with archival ink on paper, 50 x 35.5cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Abyss Series (An ongoing series), Ink and melted sugar monotype, 21 x 14.8 cm (each), 2019 – 2020
Ross Passmoor, Sediment 4, Found material monotype, 70 x 100cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ, ISXXXL04, ink and melted sugar, 98 x 150 cm, 2019, Framed
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral S03, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 34.5 x 23cm, 2020 - Sold
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral S04, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 32 x 23cm, 2020 - Sold
Ross Passmoor, Extraction 3, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Sediment 1, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Extraction 2, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Sediment 2, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Embedded 7, Found material monotype, 70 x 100cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Sediment 5, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Embedded 6, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
R oss Passmoor, Extraction 1, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Sediment 3, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral MVI, Archival Inks and acrylic medium on paper, 62 x 38.5cm (with drip), 58 x 35m paper, 2020, Framed
Kyra PapĂŠ, Abyss XXIII, Ink and sugar monotype, (15.5 x 50 cm x 5) 78,5 x 50 cm, 2019
Kyra Papé, Disrupted XL03, Relief embossing and various inks, 70 x100cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Disrupted XL02, Relief embossing and various inks, 70 x100cm, 2019 Sold
Kyra PapĂŠ, Disrupted XL04, Relief embossing and various inks, 70 x100cm, 2020 - Sold
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral MXII, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper,56,5 x 34cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Visceral MVIII, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 45 x 32cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Visceral MVII, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 44 x 29,7cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Visceral MIX, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 43.6 x 33cm, 2020
Kyra Papé, Visceral MX, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 45.7 x 33.6cm, 2020
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral MXI, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 45,7 x 33,6cm, 2020 - Sold
Kyra PapĂŠ, Visceral L01, Archival ink and acrylic medium on paper, 50 x 44,5cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Embedded 5, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Embedded 4, Found material monotype, 100 x 70cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Surface 1, Found material monotype, 56 x 75cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Object 1, Found material monotype, 70 x 50cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Object 2, Found material monotype, 70 x 50cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Small Grouping 6, Found material monotype, 50 x 35,5cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Small Grouping 5, Found material monotype, 50 x 35,5cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Small Grouping 2, Found material monotype, 50 x 35,5cm, 2020
Ross Passmoor, Finderscope Series 1- 9, Found material monotype, 25cm diameter, 2020
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