While her contemporaries were experimenting with the nihilistic theories underlying abstract art and constellation art during the late eighties, South African artist Liekie Fouché insisted on painting angels.
More than twenty years later, the post modern oil pastel paintings in which she imaginatively combines elements from past eras with an absurd sense of humor and the modern Dadaist technique of collage, often against a background of vast African landscapes, are received with enthusiasm among South African art critics and the wider public.
Ancient Influences on Christian Angels
While angels have never taken center stage, they have inspired artists over the ages in their illusive and undefined roles as messengers and helpers of the gods. Due to a lack of realistic depictions of angels in Jewish art, the angels in early Christian, Medieval and Renaissance art were to a large extend dependent on depictions from different countries and different times, like ancient Etruscan sirens, Mesopotamian demons and Greek victory goddesses. Angels are depicted as messengers between heaven and earth, and as protectors and creators.
Angels in Africa
The angels in the paintings by the South African artists have the appearance of beings from the European Medieval and Renaissance periods: Beautiful, larger than life hovering beings draped in simple loose robes. However, unlike their ancestors from Renaissance and Medieval times, these angels are hovering over vast desert landscapes, sitting in African baobab trees, wearing snakes around their necks, reflecting magical tree landscapes on their robes, and riding on indigenous African antelopes like eland, gemsbok and giraffes. Birds, butterflies, air planes, giant Venus flytraps, the moon in all her phases and even flying saucers often form part of the background.
Technique
Technically the works are painted rather than drawn with oil pastels, sometimes with a photo of an angel, a tree or a bird added. The frames are all hand made by the artist, sometimes in the form of a cross or some other elaborate Medieval or Renaissance form. Occasionally the paintings transcend their own boundaries, with angels hovering in the frame instead of inside the picture surface.
Heavenly Beings Originating From Diverse Cultures
According to the artist her angels are more spiritual than religious, which means they rather belong to a universal spiritual sphere than to specific orthodox religious descriptions. Due to the diverse origins of these beings, showing influences from Etruria, Mesopotamia and Greece and even India and China, they are quite at home in landscapes on the African continent which might, like the rest of the world, be desperately in need of assistance from heavenly beings.
New Age Spirituality
Fouche’s iconographic subject matter combined with modern elements shows signs of a post modern taste for pastiche rather than a modern obsession with experiment. At the same time, her concern for the well being of the African continent and the planet earth reminds of contemporary New Age spirituality rather than the orthodox religions underlying Medieval and Renaissance art.
Sources:
- Lehman, K., The Dome of Heaven 1945, Art Bulletin 27.4:1-27
- Lynton, N., The Story of Modern Art. Phaidon, Oxford, 1980
- Wilson, P.L., Angels, Pantheon Books, 1980
Fransi Phillips - Published author of poetry, short stories, novels, art books in Afrikaans and English Writer of art reviews in Afrikaans and English ...
