www.everardlondon.com:
Bell is facinated by ancient civilisations and their excavated artefacts. Her work incorporates powerful images and layered visual, symbolic and iconographic references of past and present worlds. In her iconography, the artist draws from a range of cultures - African, Chinese, Egyptian, Greek, early Christian, European - and a range of psychologies and philosophies, particularly the Buddhist preoccupation with stillness and the shedding of attachment and the ego.
In Bell’s recent work human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and chariots.
Bell’s artworks convey themes that have evolved through dreams, meditations, altered states, spiritual quests and the process of working. They record her journey into the mysteries of the cosmos – and, like metaphors, like symbols, her works stand for the beings, the presences, the nodes of meaning and association that she has tered along the way.
www.everard-read-capetown.co.za:
In Bell’s recent work, human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and chariots. However, her latest body of work, is characterised by a sense of coming home, a greater emphasis on the human body being on this earth. There is an increased sense of acceptance of our materiality; a surrendering to who we are, and the suggestion of an end to the constant quest for transcendence.
www.artsandcollections.com:
For much of Bell’s working life as an artist, which has included collaborations with friend and fellow South African artist, William Kentridge, she has been on a quest to connect with herself, with others, and with the mysterious forces that are inside and around her. Increasingly, her art-making has been part of a very personal, spiritual journey. She makes art to explore, to enter into the unknown, to surrender control an alter herself.
Bell is fascinated by ancient civilisations and their excavated artefacts. Her work incorporates powerful images and layered visual, symbolic and iconographic references of past and present worlds. In her iconography, the artist draws from a range of cultures – African, Chinese, Egyptian, Greek, early Christian, European – and a range of psychologies and philosophies, particularly the Buddhist preoccupation with stillness and the shedding of attachment and the ego.
Bell’s art conveys themes that have evolved through dreams, meditations, altered states, spiritual quests and the process of working. They record her journey into the mysteries of the cosmos – and, like metaphors, like symbols, her works stand for the beings, the presences, the nodes of meaning and association that she has encountered along the way. In Bell’s work human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and br>
Recently, and evident in this new body of work, the spirit animals that have transported her, and the horses in particular, have grown in scale and become more like resting places in themselves, symbols for the world or for home. Their riders have, in turn, become less protagonists, less figures with agency, and more like figures present at a greater event, experiencing something greater than themselves and being content to dwell there. Bell has arrived at a place beyond judgement, a place of realisation that each of us is a spark from the divine fire, an individual expression of a far greater mystery. Everard Read has represented Deborah Bell for a decade. This is her seventh solo exhibition with Everard Read galleries.
Exhibition: 'Enthroned'
South Africa – and the world generally – is in a middle-space between decay and regeneration, doom and redemption, the wasteland and the promised land – and it seems that the works produced by Bell for ‘Enthroned’ provide a powerful metapw to dwell and endure during such times.
www.artsandcollections.com:
Deborah Bell (b. 1957, South Africa) is one of South Africa’s most celebrated contemporary artists. She works in a range of media on canvas and paper, produces dry point etchings and large-scale bronzes. Her earlier more political work has given way to a broader, deeper investigation into the border been mortality and immortality, matter and spirit, presence and absence, the quotidian and the mythic, the grounded and transcendent. In recent years she has developed an immediately recognisable visual language, her images simple, stark, symbolic – grounded, silent, still, poised. As Ricky Burnett has stated: at the very edge of time.
Deborah Bell’s work is represented in public and private collections around the world including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Smithsonian Institute and the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, the Hara Museum, Tokyo and the IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town.
Deborah Bell (1957, Johannesburg) is a South African painter and sculptor whose works are known internationally.
Bell earned fine arts degree from the University of Witwatersrand in 1975 and in 1986 she earned Master of Arts at the same university.
Her career began in 1982 and Bell has had many solo and group exhibitions in South Africa and abroad. From 1983 to 1989 she lectured at various institutions, including the University of the Witwatersrand and the University of South Africa. She has traveled extensively in Africa, North America and Europe and in 1986 she spent two months working at the Cité Internationale des Artes in Paris. From 1986 to 1997 she collaborated with South African artists William Kentridge and Robert Hodgins on different projects. In 1997, they produced a series of images of Alfred Jarry and William Hogarth works. Together, the three artists have also created works of computer animation.
Deborah Bell is a winner of several awards, her works can be found n public and private collections around the world.
Bell is facinated by ancient civilisations and their excavated artefacts. Her work incorporates powerful images and layered visual, symbolic and iconographic references of past and present worlds. In her iconography, the artist draws from a range of cultures - African, Chinese, Egyptian, Greek, early Christian, European - and a range of psychologies and philosophies, particularly the Buddhist preoccupation with stillness and the shedding of attachment and the ego.
In Bell’s recent work human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and chariots.
Bell’s artworks convey themes that have evolved through dreams, meditations, altered states, spiritual quests and the process of working. They record her journey into the mysteries of the cosmos – and, like metaphors, like symbols, her works stand for the beings, the presences, the nodes of meaning and association that she has tered along the way.
www.everard-read-capetown.co.za:
In Bell’s recent work, human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and chariots. However, her latest body of work, is characterised by a sense of coming home, a greater emphasis on the human body being on this earth. There is an increased sense of acceptance of our materiality; a surrendering to who we are, and the suggestion of an end to the constant quest for transcendence.
www.artsandcollections.com:
For much of Bell’s working life as an artist, which has included collaborations with friend and fellow South African artist, William Kentridge, she has been on a quest to connect with herself, with others, and with the mysterious forces that are inside and around her. Increasingly, her art-making has been part of a very personal, spiritual journey. She makes art to explore, to enter into the unknown, to surrender control an alter herself.
Bell is fascinated by ancient civilisations and their excavated artefacts. Her work incorporates powerful images and layered visual, symbolic and iconographic references of past and present worlds. In her iconography, the artist draws from a range of cultures – African, Chinese, Egyptian, Greek, early Christian, European – and a range of psychologies and philosophies, particularly the Buddhist preoccupation with stillness and the shedding of attachment and the ego.
Bell’s art conveys themes that have evolved through dreams, meditations, altered states, spiritual quests and the process of working. They record her journey into the mysteries of the cosmos – and, like metaphors, like symbols, her works stand for the beings, the presences, the nodes of meaning and association that she has encountered along the way. In Bell’s work human figures have embodied the seeker on a journey, often accompanied by lions, hounds, wolves, horses and totemic modes of transport such as boats and br>
Recently, and evident in this new body of work, the spirit animals that have transported her, and the horses in particular, have grown in scale and become more like resting places in themselves, symbols for the world or for home. Their riders have, in turn, become less protagonists, less figures with agency, and more like figures present at a greater event, experiencing something greater than themselves and being content to dwell there. Bell has arrived at a place beyond judgement, a place of realisation that each of us is a spark from the divine fire, an individual expression of a far greater mystery. Everard Read has represented Deborah Bell for a decade. This is her seventh solo exhibition with Everard Read galleries.
Exhibition: 'Enthroned'
South Africa – and the world generally – is in a middle-space between decay and regeneration, doom and redemption, the wasteland and the promised land – and it seems that the works produced by Bell for ‘Enthroned’ provide a powerful metapw to dwell and endure during such times.
www.artsandcollections.com:
Deborah Bell (b. 1957, South Africa) is one of South Africa’s most celebrated contemporary artists. She works in a range of media on canvas and paper, produces dry point etchings and large-scale bronzes. Her earlier more political work has given way to a broader, deeper investigation into the border been mortality and immortality, matter and spirit, presence and absence, the quotidian and the mythic, the grounded and transcendent. In recent years she has developed an immediately recognisable visual language, her images simple, stark, symbolic – grounded, silent, still, poised. As Ricky Burnett has stated: at the very edge of time.
Deborah Bell’s work is represented in public and private collections around the world including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Smithsonian Institute and the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, the Hara Museum, Tokyo and the IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town.
Bell earned fine arts degree from the University of Witwatersrand in 1975 and in 1986 she earned Master of Arts at the same university.
Her career began in 1982 and Bell has had many solo and group exhibitions in South Africa and abroad. From 1983 to 1989 she lectured at various institutions, including the University of the Witwatersrand and the University of South Africa. She has traveled extensively in Africa, North America and Europe and in 1986 she spent two months working at the Cité Internationale des Artes in Paris. From 1986 to 1997 she collaborated with South African artists William Kentridge and Robert Hodgins on different projects. In 1997, they produced a series of images of Alfred Jarry and William Hogarth works. Together, the three artists have also created works of computer animation.
Deborah Bell is a winner of several awards, her works can be found n public and private collections around the world.