There is an exhalation that seethes through one upon stumbling upon what is often termed “rare”, be it interviews with renowned writers or artworks recovered after being “lost” for centuries.
I also marvel at what might be called an introduction to the unknown, which in itself does not imply “discovering” that which one didn’t know they had not known.
But, I still find it odd that all art lost to pillage by colonial powers is never viewed through that same lens of awe, as though the art of Africa belongs to humanity in its entirety.
The obscurity of the notion that ours is an art that deserves archiving as mere curiosities, and the inherent prejudice that ours is art that is archival by default, cannot be accepted as a norm, even in circles of art criticism and ‘appreciation” or “appropriation”.
This has led me to constantly question motives of western criticism and thus work towards recording moments in of development in African art, providing some semblances of analyses towards contemporary creative practices by artists who would otherwise be relegated to the margins of artistic landscapes.
Upon discovering the work of Daniel K Tladi at one exhibition at Aardklop Kunste Festival, a natural urge sprung to jot an article as an endeavor to explain to myself the creative visions spurred by the man’s works which I can only call naturalistic, bearing in mind my limited knowledge of various artistic movements which inform contemporary expression.
Naturalism, I had initially associated with literary schools of thought that emanated from a natural rejection of augmentations of reality, those that thrived towards amoral attitudes in the objective representation of reality with complete impartiality.
When later I became acquainted with various other movements of expression that highlighted nature as the first principle of reality, art forms that attempted to depict the human subject in its formative relationship with natural habitats and social milieu, it invariably became abundantly clear that a new wave of naturalism is being remodeled through oils and brushworks, strokes of a younger emergent generation of South African painters.
Having exhibited his art at various South African art institutes and galleries such as the NWU Gallery and The B Gallery, either in group exhibitions or a solo artists, Daniel K Tladi’s collection always reflects an uncanny preponderance for banal moments between moments of the spectacular, these undefined silences implicit of a patient flow with the time and spaces he captures.
With a visual accuracy approaching that of photography, at a glance, his detailing of landscapes and their magnanimity presented as plausible, rather provides glimpses into a life most often thought of as antiquated and long gone.
Daniel further eclipses his interpretations of nature with paintings of unadulterated rural life; the arduous nature of earthbound toil that characterizes marginalized communities fused with social tension prevalent in contemporary South Africa.
His aesthetic system is not one that attempts to constitute itself as a faithful imitation of realistic objects in natural environments, but conversely capturing transient testimonies of those object in time, with a distinct focus on the barren spaces emerging from canvases representing representational worlds without omitting guarantees of inner truths.
This divergence from notions of exactitude without exhausting the variable potential embedded in events and images depicting those events, is a signature that acknowledges the plurality and dynamism of nature, often speaking to themes of climate change through drought stricken localities, and gender disparities through representation of rural expediency of archaic roles allotted women folk.
Much as art produced by artists of African descent has often been viewed with the condescending lens of western patronage, salaciously viewed as products from the lower rungs of global imaginary evolution, there is an emergent curatorship that has positioned such artists into isolated arena and splendor of fine art galleries.
These efforts continue to nurture and unearth formidable talent not constrained by the modernist agenda often go unnoticed due to certain unpalatable themes of endemic poverty, gendered violence, political rhetoric echoing anti-colonial dispositions.
Artists such as Daniel are contesting a colonial view steeped in ”an apartheid fetishist romanticism” of African social environments, devoid of critical engagement with psychological nuances of the environments and its people.
A unique voice in an otherwise art world scandalized by old-fashioned concepts of “high art”, Daniel is carving a career with a fiercely local recourse, a sophisticated technique not detached from formalism but woven within a collision of style and aesthetic unique to his human nature and arch sentimentality. Extending the traditions of oil painting into personalized views of social life, his work is composed beyond the chaotic and often immanent gloom of many black livelihoods.
And with an evident commercial acumen that has allowed him to sell paintings to local and international collectors, it is vividly evidenced that there is rapidly growing demand for contemporary African art. This hunger for African art, after centuries of being relegated to museums as specimen of lower humanity, is also staking the hope of contemporary artists on a market that can receive their work.
Chromatic composition of blues, greys coalescing in oranges exploding at times into dreamy golden glows of midday light, a diffusion of strokes of oils to yield unexpected hues of sunset vibrancy; such delicate details by virtue of necessity on the part of the artist, evince a particular fundamental humanity and humility of craft.
Practice without public acclaim, voicing a political sensibility to the lives of black folk for instance, are markedly a move away from a multitude of creative practitioners concerned with non-vicarious representations of the black experience.
Theirs is an emerging, though unacknowledged black art culture, producing accessible work that interrogates complex geographies of poverty, denuded environments as well as the spiritual traumas of exclusion and exploitation, while also lauding the jovial pleasantries of a life given unto fate.
A vexed and complex history manifests itself quite constantly in Daniel’s art, and it is inevitable that the spirit of each place finds expression through his brushwork. And for an artist to immerse himself in this endless quest for authenticity is but a trait of resilient craftsmanship, a hallmark of all selfless creative spirits.
Images courtesy of: Daniel K Tladi
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