Artists ride high at Wavescape
Sue Williamson, Rwanda car guard Eric Karangwa turn surfboards into art
A FORMER car guard from Rwanda and a veteran South African artist whose work can be seen at the Museum of Modern Art in New York are two new additions to the annual Wavescape Art Board Project.
The Wavescape Surf and Ocean Festival in Cape Town has added Eric Karangwa and Sue Williamson to the art project, which this year sees 11 surfboards turned into art by South African artists, and one wooden board crafted by youth from the 9 Miles Project, an organisation that uses surfing as a tool to uplift, support and educate.
Karangwa and Williamson join famous regulars Lionel Smit and Brett Murray for the exhibition, which is on show at Jack Black’s Taproom in Diep River.
The auction, with Nik Rabinowitz, takes place next Wednesday. Last year, it raised R772 000 for ocean-related charities such as the NSRI, Waves For Change and the 9 Miles Project.
After fleeing genocide in Rwanda and living in refugee camps, Karangwa found his way to Cape Town. He worked as a car guard at an upmarket shopping mall in Constantia where he taught himself to paint.
Now he is sponsored by the Art Society of South Africa and exhibits at Kirstenbosch Gardens with his mentor, Andrew Cooper.
Apart from her work at the Museum of Modern Art, internationally-acclaimed Williamson is represented at the Tate Modern and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Trained as a printmaker, she also works in photography and video.
The newcomers bring a unique collection of skills.
Other notable newcomers are Ruby Swinney, Chris Slabber, Paul Senyol, Kirsten Beets, Swain Hoogervorst, Andrew Sutherland and Chris Soal.
Soal explores sculpture with preexisting materials, especially singleuse items such as bottle tops and toothpicks.
In 2018, he won the PPC Imaginarium prize and is included in local and international collections.
Hoogervorst’s first solo exhibition, Inside Out, took place at the AVA Gallery in Cape Town in 2014 to much acclaim. He has had residencies in the Netherlands (2013) and Finland (2015) and is exhibited nationally and internationally.