NICOLAAS MARITZ
DAPPLED VIEWS
NICOLAAS MARITZ
DAPPLED VIEWS An exhibition of recent landscape paintings
7 - 27 MARCH 2020
Dawid Ras Gallery Sandton, South Africa
Introduction Most of the landscape works on this exhibition were inspired by a road trip through the Northern Cape and southern part of Namibia during December 2018. Flat and barren wastes, now and then interspersed with sudden crusty rock formations with deep shadows; such personable geological events in an otherwise seemingly endless wasteland. This inhospitable dry landscape glided by, as the tar road stretched straight ahead, like a pencil line over brown paper. No rain has fallen here since I don’t know when. But it’s beautiful in its own repulsive way. There were few people about, and the one’s I noticed, seemed to appear out of nowhere, and to be living very far apart. The sheep looked tired, in the nicest way possible. The inhospitable aspect of the landscape was exacerbated by extremely hot weather during the day. And a blistering sun. But towards evening a surprisingly cool wind came up. At night the moon and the stars were so much more brilliant than I could recall. The fresh morning landscape was deliciously bathed in a soft and surreal violet light, which I found didn’t photograph well at all. But the purples have always been such difficult colours, especially when it comes to painting; so often too telling, too prosaic… Back home, I have to trust my memory to create a painted version of my journey; to re-live some of the landscapes. In doing this, I like afresh the problematic flat dimensionality of layered paint, the ambiguous order of a chaotic mess, and the ironic coolth of emotionally charged colour. I feel I have succeeded if a
successful photograph cannot be taken of the work; that something is left to the intimacy of a primary encounter. I certainly hope to be painting and showing pictures till I die. This I say to myself over another cup of milky tea. A hill with trees. The sea at sunrise. The sea almost any time of day. Blindingly bright days. Cold and bleak winter weather. The golden glow of autumnal light. All these things we can share. No-one can take this away from us. (Oh dear, I clean forgot about global warming. Shit shit shit!) Nicolaas Maritz Darling, February 2020
1. Koppie near Aris, 2019, enamel paint on board. 695 x 800mm
2. Hill Construction, 2019, enamel paint on board. 410 x 800mm
3. LEFT A 1959-style Windhoek Koppie, 2019, enamel paint on board. 790 x 590mm
4. RIGHT Flowering Thorn Trees near Windhoek, 2019, enamel paint on board. 590 x 790mm
5. Silver and Blue, 2019, enamel paint on board, 320 x 480mm
6. Night Coloured Landscape, 2019, enamel paint on board. 300 x 489mm
7. Blackthorn Veld, 2019, enamel paint on board, 1180 x 970mm
8. Night Heat, 2019, enamel paint on board. 360 x 486mm
9. Geological Slice, 2018, enamel paint on board. 295 x 430mm
10. Starless Night, 2019, enamel paint on board. 512 x 800mm
11. LEFT Night Heat, 2019, enamel paint on board. 360 x 486mm
12. RIGHT Full Moon near Garies, 2018, enamel paint on board. 538 x 604mm
13. Sectional Nightscape (Four parts), 2018/19, enamel paint and mixed media on board, 1000 x 2330mm.
Biography Nicolaas Maritz was born in 1959 in Pretoria. He went to school in Pretoria and Port Elizabeth. In 1977, he qualified as an army chef and butcher. From 1978 1981 he received tertiary art education at the University of Cape Town. His first one-man exhibition was held in 1976, in Port Elizabeth, and he has exhibited regularly at galleries and museums in South Africa and overseas. This multimedia artist’s work is represented in most of the art museums and public collections in South Africa. Maritz has also lectured in art and design at the universities of Cape Town and Stellenbosch, as well as at private art schools in Cape Town and Pretoria.
The artist has received international recognition for graphic design, and for illustrations of children’s and other books, notably two American illustration awards: the NCSS CBC Notable 1992 Children's Trade Book award in the field of Social Studies, USA for SOMEWHERE IN AFRICA (I. Mennen & N. Daly), Duttons, New York, and in 1994, the Parents' Choice Illustration Honor, USA, for ONE SUN RISES, (W. Hartmann ), Duttons, New York. In 2019 he received the IBBY SA Best Illustrations Award for South African Animal Portraits A-Z, published by David Philip (New Africa Books), Cape Town.
Nicolaas Maritz has extensive internet presence, and any search result will show several sites, image galleries, as well as references to his work as an experimental musician: go to https://sites.google.com/view/ nicolaasmaritzgallery The artist lives and works in Darling, where he has a permanent exhibition space, the Maritz Museum, open to the public by appointment. His hobbies are cooking, gardening and armchair installation art.
DAWID RAS GALLERY 18 Silvela Road SANDOWN ESTATE JOHANNESBURG Tel: +27 (0)11 444 5480 Cell:+27 (0) 82 492 9777 Email: mdawidr@iafrica.com www.dawidras.com