Dirt is Good at THAT ART FAIR

Dirt is Good Process-based, time-based soil installation 27 February – 1 March 2015 Created on the first day of THAT ART FAIR, in Salt River, I created this drawing/design by pouring soil from my garden into lines and neatening each line with a paint brush.

I invited Fair goers to add drawings and thoughts onto paper, which I then integrated into the drawing. Over the next two days of the Fair the installation changed as people walked over and through it. Passers-by thus collaborated by giving their thoughts as well as changing the soil drawing with their feet.

Passers-by collaborated by giving their thoughts as well as changing the soil drawing

So often we only value art that would last, and even outlast us. But how much more valuable is art and expression that captures our own fleeting nature and the impermanence of everything we experience. It is in the fleeing and present moment that we find real value – not in dwelling in the past, not in worrying about the future.

We have been conditioned to believe that dust and dirt is ‘bad’, and kids are now kept from playing the mud in the way that I used to play in the mud. We forget that the most nutritious and healthy foods come from the soil, and not a fridge, lab or factory.

I think it’s time to rethink and relook how we feel about the world around us.

Land Art in Arderne's Garden, Claremont

I am part of a group of artists who meet  in a different place once every month to create site-specific temporary art installations with the materials we find around us. Here's what I created during the August gathering. Want to know more about the gatherings? Read more...

Current Experiments and Expressions

At any particular time I usually have to put in time and effort to clear space on my studio table. I am always surrounded by unfinished works (it's a curse!), experiments, natural materials from a recent walk or the garden, notes, quick sketches, and other bits that contribute to the chaos in my studio. Often I have gems hiding in unexpected corners because of this, and sometimes I am able to group together things that really work well together. Here's a selection of some of the many things that are currently occupying surface space in the studio:

A beautiful richly-coloured soil from the garden. I have no idea what I would like to do with it, I might end up making it finer with my mortar-and-pestle, and taking a photo of it strewn onto a piece of glass - then using the photo in the Nuances work I am currently working on. 

Some abstract sketches, possibly in preparation of some of the bigger works for my exhibition:

More bits of 'work in progress'

One of the pieces of seaweed from my recent Gordon's Bay sessions, now stitched onto paper with brown thread:

Detail from a large mixed media artwork in progress:

More land art on Gordon's Bay beach

Small elongated pieces of rock that seems to 'sliver' off from large rocks, planted into the sand, and washed away by the tide

These are the rocks where I found the long pieces of rock. There are several yellow rocks lying around, which I used to accentuate a natural cleft between the rocks.

New work: February 2014

More information on this work and two other new Nuances works:

Spirit of the Desert: janetbotes.com/spiritofthedesert

Sinai Mountains: janetbotes.com/sinaimountains

Oludeniz: janetbotes.com/oludeniz

I am also doing some interesting 'experiments', drying kelp and sea lettuce:

See more

And... this morning I spent my early morning on Gordon's Bay beach to create land art. View photographs on my website or facebook page.

Work in Progress: African rock in Plaster-of-paris shape

Hartland Swartland

landskap hartland

vlaktes van gister se son, wind en weer

oopgevlek vir die toekoms se woeker en weet

van wild leef. 

stilwees.

hartland sandland

oggendwasem wat wegsmelt voor die son

terwyl ons langsaam voorstloer

en uitreik na verre horison

strandland swartskaap

wegvee van my spore deur wind se wieg

en wegdraai en hardloop

na horisonsbedrieg

moederland swartland

my hart lê begrawe

in die sand van Afrika

met mynskag se sweepslag

in die doodstil oggendmis

- janet botes, 2013

Inspiration: Suikerbossie

Photos taken during a group hike with Intuition Walks (intuitionwalks.com), doing the Suikerbossie Contour walk, towards Orange Kloof & Constantia Nek through a indigenous forest to the waterfall at Myburgh's Kloof.

Siklus: ritme in dood en groei

This is the artwork that I created and finished for the Hiernamaals | Hereafter exhibition at Slee Gallery, Stellenbosch. It will be on exhibit from 1-10 March 2013, don't miss it! For more information about the exhibition, view this blog post, the Facebook event page or the Site_Specific website

Siklus: ritme in dood en groei

Artist's Statement/ Description: 
There exists a complex and intricate balance and rhythm in death and growth - the process of death, decay and rejuvenation. Decayed matter in nature gives sustenance and feeds new growth, in nature there is no 'waste'. In this artwork natural materials, objects, organisms are used in juxtaposition with man-made and discarded/found material - the latter perceived as 'waste' by the general public, but as a source or substrate for creation for artists like us. The bronze/golden thread that helps to tie and entwine it together, holding the depicted process together, aims to evoke the image of the proverbial heavenly golden streets, and a spider's web. These hinting at the beauty, perfection and holiness - sacredness - of natural processes of life, death, decay and regrowth. 

Medium: Natural & Found material assemblage 2013
Dimensions: 350 x 380 x 75mm'
Year: 2013