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| Regeneration and rebirth - by Dawn Barkhuizen: Daily Dispatch 10/2007 |
| The fascination with fire and the desire to tame it is as old as humanity itself. |
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Today contemporary artists, including Eastern Cape landscape painter Greg Schultz, are still mesmerised by this primordial and contradictory force, says Dawn Barkhuizen.
Artists who work with fire are not a new phenomenon. French neo-es Klein for example, made fire sculptures and even used a blow-torch to create his images in the 1960s.
Among South Africa’s contemporary artists, big names like William Kentridge, Clive van den Berg, Sandile Zulu and Diane Victor have also used fire in a variety of ways in their art making.
Now East London landscape painter Greg Schultz has joined their ranks. “I have been working with paint for 20 years and the time has come to expand, to shift gear, to find new ways of mark making, to relinquish control to some extent,” he says. And so he began experimenting, covering his painted images with wax, pouring on turpentine and torching the canvases. At first he almost incinerated the work, burning large holes in the canvases. But slowly he gained control, learning just how far he could push the process before it all went up in smoke.
Now he knows exactly when to cool things down, flinging water onto the flames, which has the added effect of creating random splatters and further texture.
“Jackson Pollock said he had total control when he splattered enamel paint onto his canvasses, but I don’t believe that it is entirely possible, especially when nature is part of it - there has to be an element of chance, “says Schultz.
And, he admits, he’s come to enjoy the rush.
“It’s really exciting compared to ordinary painting in the studio. The flames can get as tall as I am and I’ve got to move quickly if I don’t want them to burn right through the canvas,” he says.
Earlier this year East London multi-media artist Andrew Mogridge filmed Schultz’s pyrotechnics at his Kwelera home and Schultz used the video clip as an entrancing component of his latest exhibition, Mediators, in Port Elizabeth.
But for Schultz the use of fire is not just mark making – there is a personal dimension to his using this process.
After being poisoned by chemicals and almost dying several years ago, fire came to symbolize purification, a means of burning away the dross.
“Physical regeneration was crucial to my survival, and for me fire was representative of that process,” he says.
Along with that he was also captivated by the contradictory nature of fire – its representation of both heaven and hell, good and evil, creation and destruction. He refers to Yves Klein’s eloquent definition:” Fire is both intimate and universal. It resides in our hearts, it resides in a candle. It rises up from the depths of matter, and it conceals itself, latent, contained, like hate or patience. Of all phenomena it is the only one that so obviously embodies two values: good and evil. It shines in paradise and burns in hell. It can contradict itself and therefore it is one of the universal principals.”
And lastly, Schultz says, fire is an integral part of his landscape in Kwelera, where raging veldfires and the ability to tame them can be a matter of life or death.
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