Eclectica Contemporary is situated in the heart of Cape Town’s CBD. It hosts an impressive, carefully chosen, group of Artists. The Gallery, with it multiple levels set in an historical heritage building, attempts to question old traditions with new voices in Contemporary Art.

In our ‘Fusion Vol 3.’ exhibition, we have selected a group of esteemed South African Artists. Each Artist has been chosen for their preferred medium, allowing us to showcase the variety of skills, styles and concepts we have on offer

It’s the beginning of a new year and an opportunity to show some new talent as well as remind you of some of our regular artists. Fusion Vol 3 – putting the ‘eclectic’ in ‘Eclectica Contemporary’

Ibrahim Khatab

Ibrahim Khatab, a Cairo born artist, currently lectures at the National University of Cairo and has exhibited both locally and internationally. His art showcases his knowledge and technical skills of paintings, installations and video art. Ibrahim’s artworks visually expresses the artist’s deep love of calligraphy, as well as colour, space, movement and arabic script which all factor heavily in his practice.

Ibrahim Khatab feels that Islamic Calligraphy played a poignant role in the education of art and writing. Then and now, the medium is seen to be an important element of the Arabic cultural legacy, an eternal heritage that Khatab fell in love with when he was 10 year’s old. Years of honing the technical skill allowed him to use this talent as a source of income (by designing banners for commercial spaces and beautifying the pilgrims’ houses who had arrived from Mecca)and it has become central to his designs as a practicing artist today.

Chelsea Peter

Chelsea was born in Johannesburg in 1996. She has lived and grown up in Cape Town since 2007. She has completed her BAFA (2019) at the University of Cape Town, Michaelis School of Fine Art.

“We exist in a system that is rooted in ego, forever hungry and yet never wholeheartedly fulfilled as it thrives on consumption and devastation. It’s no wonder that we are so far detached from the inner Self, the Creator and natural ways of being and coexisting. Capitalism has produced a society where the things one owns is seen as somewhat more defining of one’s character than one’s actions or morals. This is why I create paintings of objects to depict the subject. Being born into a capitalist, consumerist system forms the essence of this exhibition. We’re addicted to material objects, we’re addicted to validation, we’re addicted to more and we’re rarely fulfilled. We’re a fast-paced society of quick-fixes and short-term satisfaction and once we’re no longer satisfied, we throw whatever it is away and move onto the next.”

Vincent Osemwegie

Born in 1977, Nigerian painter Vincent Osemwegie’s continuous creative journey led him to South Africa in 2009. Vincent was born into a large family, with 21 siblings. Within the busy chaos of this childhood, art offered a means of quiet entertainment and as such, he was often found with a sketchbook in hand experimenting and playing with form and shape. Since arriving in South Africa in 2009, Vincent settled in Johannesburg, participating in various gallery and museum exhibitions. He first exhibited with Eclectica Contemporary in 2017.

Integral to his expressive technique, Vincent combines active movement through the dripping of paint to not only render subject matter, but to trace its construction. He explores ideas of physicality through motion and pairs this with the layering of materials to allude to the construction of form being multi-layered.

Cobus Haupt

Haupt is well established as a bronze sculpture that draws on history, popular culture and tradition to produce artworks that are visually interesting, tactile and playful. The process and method of bronze casting informs Haupt’s work both formally and conceptually. The tendency to include cracks, flaws and unresolved imperfections that bears witness to the casting process catalogues the tactile history and the bronze technique itself, and also comments on Haupt’s rendering of the human figure. Human beings are understood as unique, fragile and remarkable due to his or her so-called imperfections, flaws and scars. These human ‘defects’ and ‘deformities’ bear, as in the case of the bronze casting process, witness to their engagement with life. Due to the importance of the process, Haupt undertakes all the aspects of the sculpting process himself from the mould making to the casting.

Asanda Kupa

Asanda Kupa is a rising talent amongst South African painters. He was born in Molteno, in the Eastern Cape and has always been drawn to the illustrative arts. He began his higher studies in 2005, furthering his studies in 2008 and also has worked closely with fellow painter and acclaimed artist, Aleta Michelatos. Kupa has won numerous awards, throughout his study period and after, winning the Reinhold Cassirer Award in 2013. His expressive mark making and abstraction of the human form creates a vivid and moving body of work that seems to explore change, progression and alteration through the language of narrative painting in a uniquely abstract manner. Kupa’s gestural works command a great presence in each space they can be found and his investment of time, energy and emotion as well as immense skill becomes apparent.

“This body of work is informed by a process in which I try to unlearn the ways I was taught by society: how things are or how they are done… things like culture and customs or religion. I have tried to depict my figures as spirit beings and by this, unusual or strange in a sense. I wanted to achieve a sense of mystery and questioning. This I also hope the exhibition encourages people to dig deep into culture and the way in which the universe provides small signs and omens for one’s path in life.”

Asanda Kupa
Thoban’ amaxhala
2016
Acrylic on canvas
205 x 140 cm

Asanda Kupa
Kwabamathamb’ amhlophe
2016
Acrylic on canvas
87 x 69 cm

Qhama Maswana

Qhama Maswana is a South African artist born in King Williams Town in 1991. He is currently based in the Eastern Cape where he produces work from his home studio. Maswana obtained a National Diploma in Fine Art in 2015 from the University of Fort Hare, where he refined his craft and developed the conceptual and visual language evident in his work.

Working intently to produce work that successfully conveys issues around beauty and other struggles witnessed on the continent, Qhama harnesses inspiration from Africa. Drawing inspiration from the people interacts with, he focuses on articulating the beauty and the strength they possess. The people depicted in his works often come from economically depressed communities – Qhama sees it as his duty as an artist to recreate the image of these bodies in a new light, one that portrays the royalty Maswana sees inside of them. Through painting, Qhama hopes to make the subjects he interacts with visible and present.

The main focus of these works is to breathe life into a long forgotten heritage, portraying people he finds fascinating in order to create an opportunity for people to connect and engage with the bodies portrayed. Attempting to cultivate a deeper understanding by retelling the narrative as accurately as the reality Qhama has experienced and witnessed. This emphasizes the notion of a ‘new dawn’ through his process of re-representation.

Qhama Maswana
New Dawn
2018
Acrylic on canvas
90.2 x 70

Paul Daniels

“Born on the 12th of July 1975, I have been an artist from an early age, as a youngster in the early 1990’s I was well aware of the many shortcomings I would have to face and overcome, yet I never stopped drawing. I developed a fascination for watercolours and oil point. After I finished matric I went to further my studies at Athlone Technical College, where enrolled to study boiler making. I loved working with forms and sheet metal. I love creating art pieces whether in metal form, clay, paint or ink sketches. I sold numerous paintings to private clients local and abroad.

I work in an abstract-semi realistic style. I take inspiration from life and natural forms. The work I produce are presented sometimes as collages and colourful yet addressing very serious social issues, and my background as a graffiti artist and my keen interest in cartooning makes it easy to form together the puzzle of my paintings and raise awareness .I try to draw the viewer into my world and my thoughts. I render my works both colourful and dim moods to illustrate the concern or the joy of being in these diverse spaces. It is my mission to both entertain and make aware socially and politically the difficulties of our daily realities.”