Braam Kruger - Hounds Of Hell
Braam Kruger
South African 1950-2008
Hounds Of Hell
1988
signed and dated 88;
oil on board
112 by 158cm excluding frame; 130 by 174 by 5,5cm including frame
Provenance
Stephan Welz & Co, Johannesburg, 20 April 2009, lot 330.
Private Collection.
Exhibited
Polokwane Art Museum, Polokwane, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, 30 July to 25 August 2009.
UJ Art Gallery, Johannesburg, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, 2 September to 14 October 2009.
Literature
UJ Art Gallery, Johannesburg, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, exhibition catalogue, illustrated in colour on page 25.
“Braam Kruger dug deep into the Western art canon in his art, appropriating and/or co-opting, among others, David’s Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1801), Ruben’s The Rape of Europe (1630) and Delacroix’s Liberty on the Barricades (1830) to create a cheeky brand of postmodern art that, at times, used the past as a prism to reflect on the present.”1 The present lot, The Hounds of Hell, draws on hundreds of existing images, notably of Cerberus, the mythological creature guarding the underworld, to intimate the dire political oppression of the disenfranchised in the South Africa of the 1980s. An irreverent Kruger gives an almost cartoonish rendering of that monstrous time in our history.
1. ArtAfrica archived review.
Braam Kruger
South African 1950-2008
Hounds Of Hell
1988
signed and dated 88;
oil on board
112 by 158cm excluding frame; 130 by 174 by 5,5cm including frame
Provenance
Stephan Welz & Co, Johannesburg, 20 April 2009, lot 330.
Private Collection.
Exhibited
Polokwane Art Museum, Polokwane, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, 30 July to 25 August 2009.
UJ Art Gallery, Johannesburg, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, 2 September to 14 October 2009.
Literature
UJ Art Gallery, Johannesburg, Braam Kruger 1950 – 2008, exhibition catalogue, illustrated in colour on page 25.
“Braam Kruger dug deep into the Western art canon in his art, appropriating and/or co-opting, among others, David’s Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1801), Ruben’s The Rape of Europe (1630) and Delacroix’s Liberty on the Barricades (1830) to create a cheeky brand of postmodern art that, at times, used the past as a prism to reflect on the present.”1 The present lot, The Hounds of Hell, draws on hundreds of existing images, notably of Cerberus, the mythological creature guarding the underworld, to intimate the dire political oppression of the disenfranchised in the South Africa of the 1980s. An irreverent Kruger gives an almost cartoonish rendering of that monstrous time in our history.
1. ArtAfrica archived review.
