Sonderlinge Jenny Reyneke Art Exhibition 3 March

CATALOGUE

Solo art exhibition at Johann Van Heerden’s Art and Gallery

593 Jacqueline Drive

Garsfontein, Pretoria, 0001 South Africa

SONDERLINGE

EXHIBITION OPENING - 3RD MARCH 2024

JENNY REYNEKE ART

Exhibition: SONDERLINGE

Gallery: JVH Art and Gallery

Curator: Johann Van Heerden

Curator: Miekie Lourens

INFO

For all purchases please contact the Art Gallery

https://jvhartgallery.co.za/exhibition-catalogues/ catalogue?id=65c20ec40f834352d3177927

Johann Van Heerden’s Art and Gallery 593 Jacqueline Drive Garsfontein, Pretoria, 0001 South Africa

INSPIRATION

Sonderlinge has been inspired by the trees, lands and skies of the Kalahari - Northern Cape South Africa

THEMES EXPLORED

These are the textures of my life. These are the trees of my known rocky paths. This is the bright light sky at the close of day. These are the colours of veld that guide my way.

This heart. The heat. The becomings. This is the seeing and being at my feet.

This crackle of sand. This noise in the silence and the unsilent air.

And ‘everywhere’ saying... I am here.

I am there.

01

The Truth Journeys

Sketches of desert friends and confidantes and the lessons that they share with me. Included amongst these are the Project X sketches.

02

Circles of Life

Moments observed and captured on circular canvases.

03

Kalahari Skies

A seduction of light. The promises of rain that rarely comes to the desert and the shimmering air.

I GROW OLDE

an archaic spelling of ‘ old’ that is generally used in the names of places...

On the opening of Sonderlinge Exhibition on the 3rd of March 2024, I will be 11 years older than my father. He passed away when I was 15 years old and the night before he passed, I must have had a premonition, because that evening I was inconsolable. Consumed by a nameless sorrow.

I was at boarding school at the time and was granted permission to call him that next morning from the hostel.It was a Saturday. My words then, were inadequate in trying to explain my unfathomable sadness and concern and love for him.

He said to me, “Jen, if you ever need me, go find a tree, and I will be there.”

His last spoken words to me.

But I have been searching for him and loving him through conversations with trees ever since.

There are unspoken things and emotions that are best untangled or found in the company of trees. In the Kalahari, trees are few and far between and difficult to approach. Their thorns and briars make them impossible to hug, except the Shepherd’s Tree or Witgat Boom. The Mother Tree.

I go to the trees to hear my heart

She stands defiant in the unfathomable heat shaking her arms at the relentless Northern wind. She teaches me much about overcoming the elements and the pain of living and growing olde, pressing on and forward. She has many names but I find alot of my own mother in her, and the older I become, see more of my own self. I recognise and find deep comfort in that resemblance.

Three other notable mentors in my Sonderlinge Collection, who have been both inspration and comfort are Jessica, Krystyna and Ché. I admire and aspire to your courage and perseverence and am deeply grateful for your presence in my life.

Truth Journeys

“There you are. You praying mantis, hotnotsgod. Inviting me in as you would your prey. In this... on this... first attempt to fathom the why, the how of what this is? Tomorrow... I think that I will tidy you up... but I find the mess of you drawing me in.

Comforting.

Your mess detracts from my mindmess. And for a moment while we danced our crooked and clumsy dance it was good. The hags in the heat you and I, old tree. For the painted moment, free.

Our abandonment age.

There is a fine line between the losing it and the letting go.” Journal entry

You began in chaos, borne of the ‘Ougat Pyne’ and my trying to come to terms with all things beyond and out of my control.

You were the first to reach out to me, to remind me to look up, look forward, to see the light and all that lay beyond in futures unknown and uncharted.

As you turned and changed beneath my brush, calmness set in. Into the blue our iridescent cares, concerns and pains.

RNK2024_02_09_71x71_Fragility

71cm x 71cm

Oil on canvas

CATALOGUE

Large format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON CANVAS

RNK2024_02_17_71x71_Escape 71cm x 71cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_19_71x71_Heat 71cm x 71cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_18_71x71_Alone - Just the Two of Us 71cm x 71cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_39_42x42_Reendans4

42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

CATALOGUE

Medium format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON WOODBLOCK

RNK2024_02_37_42x42_Reendans2 42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_38_42x42_Reendans3 42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_39_42x42_Reendans4 42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_11_61x23_Will it rain 61cm x 23cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_11_61x23_Bow to the storm 61cm x 23cm Oil on canvas

CATALOGUE

Medium format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON CANVAS

RNK2024_02_13_50x40_Where is home

50cm x 40cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_14_50 x40_My friend the tree 50cm x 40cm

Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_01_20x20_Rhythm1 20cm x 20cm Oil on woodblock

CATALOGUE

Small format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON WOODBLOCK/ CANVAS FRAME

RNK2024_02_07_30x23_Close of day 30cm x 23cm Oil on canvas

RNK2024_02_02_20x20_Rhythm 20cm x 20cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_04_20x20_Rhythm 20cm x 20cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_03_20x20_Rhythm 20cm x 20cm Oil on woodblock

Windows into my world

CATALOGUE

Small format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON WOODBLOCK

Gentler into the heat of day, a mother’s words of advice to look at the big picture in many smaller manageable parts. Focus on and be present in the moment at hand.

Find the beauty in a single breath.

Seek the patterns of the abstract that become the whole when placed together.

RNK2024_02_05_44x44_Windows 44cm x 44cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_06_44x44_Windows 44cm x 44cm Oil on woodblock

DETAIL

44cm x 44cm

Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_06_44x44_Windows2

Contrasts

CATALOGUE

Medium format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON WOODBLOCK

Night and Day. The awakening hours before sun when all is silent. The evening succumbs to the first heart beats of morning.

A liquid, velvet sky easing into day in this land of contrasts.

RNK2024_02_36_42x42_Night and Day2 42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

RNK2024_02_35_42x42_Night and Day1 42cm x 42cm Oil on woodblock

Portals

RNK2024_02_28_41x41_Sky3

41cm x 41cm

Oil on round canvas

CATALOGUE

Medium format size

MEDIUM: OIL ON CANVAS ROUND

Here where I stand. From my vantage point, a seeking and a searching for direction. A beacon in the distance to transport me to a place of peace.

To embrace the wild and untamed. Embrace the chaos of the unknown and bravely step into the experience of it.

RNK2024_02_26_41x41_Sky1

41cm x 41cm

Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_27_41x41_Sky2 41cm x 41cm

Oil on round canvas

Circles of life

RNK2024_02_15_51x51_Circles2

51cm x 51cm

Oil on round canvas

CATALOGUE

Mediuum format size

MEDIIUM: OIL ON CANVAS ROUND

The trees of life. Continuity and coming full circle. There is always a purpose. Even as darkness is present, it enhances the light. And so too in our living. We need both to distinguish our ways forward.

RNK2024_02_16_51x51_Circles4

51cm x 51cm

Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_10_51x51_Circles1

51cm x 51cm

Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_20_31x31_Circles3

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_21_31x31_Circles5

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_24_31x31_Circles8

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_22_31x31_Circles6

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_25_31x31_Circles9

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_29_31x31_Circles10

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_23_31x31_Circles7

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_31_41x41_Circles12

41cm x 41cmOil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_32_41x41_Circles13

41cm x 41cmOil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_30_31x31_Circles11

31cm x 31cm Oil on round canvas

RNK2024_02_33_41x41_Circles14

41cm x 41cmOil on round canvas

SONDERLINGE

I originally thought that I would call my exhibition Textures of Life, but Sonderling speaks better of where my spirit is at and reflects the way I am feeling and the state I am in at the moment better than Textures of Life or Letting Go.

This dichotomy of being torn between love and hate and feeling outcast and yet part of the landscape making me a Sonderling.

I wanted a name that speaks to this unfathomable heat, that speaks of overcoming and that represents the eccentricity of trees and flora in this desert and their resilience, persistence and ability to withstand the elements and still manage to tap into nature’s miraculous beauty.

I like that the word means more than its literal meaning for me... for this place where I am at is both vloekwoord and wonderwerk… and unlike any place I have ever experienced. I love it and hate it in equal measures... and just when I think I want to pack my bags and run to the well known and familiar forest with its soothing shade... It seduces me with the most amazing and spectacular skies at the close of day... and I find myself forgetting to breathe. It is so beautiful.

limitless skies.

Sonderlinge means something that is eccentric, unusual, out of the ordinary and at the same time outcast... on the outskirts, not of the norm... something that is apart from. Afgesonder.

Building a work is for me a balance act between chance and control. Intentionality submitting to the letting go. I often spend hours in detail which I then obliterate with diluted oil splatter. Giving over to chaos. A reminder to myself that I am not the artist... the moment is.

And the works I love most are not necessarily of me but simply in my willingness to make myself available to the act of creating. The ‘artist’ is a medium, much like the paint, the ‘artist’ is but a tool much like the palette knife or the brush. The true art already fleshed out, interwoven in the ether and predestined long before its becoming. As ‘artist’ I simply show up and say to the land ‘use me’. And as soon as I begin to feel that the ‘I’ in me is trying too hard... i destruct what I have arrogantly built.

I am like these bent and weathered desert trees silhouetted and singular against the endless and

Lessons in humility. In surprise and delight.

Jenny Reyneke Artist