Judith Mason

Judith Mason and squirrel monkey October 1980

Judith Mason was born Judith Seelander Menge in Pretoria, South Africa on 10 October 1938. Mason is a technically disciplined artist working in oil, pencil, printmaking and mixed media. Her work is rich in symbolism and mythology, and displays a rare technical virtuosity.

About the Artist

Self-portrait at 90

Judith Mason was born in Pretoria; South Africa, in 1938. She matriculated at the Pretoria High School for Girls in 1956. In 1960, she was awarded a BA Degree in Fine Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand. She taught painting at the University of the Witwatersrand, the University of Pretoria, the Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town, Scuola Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence, Italy from 1989–91 and acted as external examiner for under-graduate and post-graduate degrees at Pretoria, Potchefstroom, Natal, Stellenbosch and Cape Town Universities. Several of Mason's works deal with the atrocities uncovered by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.[1]

Philosophy

Judith Mason is politically aware and motivated by a strong social conscience. Her work is informed by people, creatures, events and sometimes works of poetry, that have touched or deeply disturbed her. Her images run the gamut from expressionist through representational, humorous and starkly symbolic. The history, mythology and ritual of Christianity and the eastern religions provide a fertile fund of inspiration for her work. Mason feels that formalised theology has destroyed the spiritually-nourishing mythological character of primitive religion.

"Mason’s pieces are sometimes imbued with lyrical and poetic overtones, and sometimes informed by the poetry of Christopher Smart and Wilfred Owen, another important feature of her work is the synthesis she establishes between beauty and ugliness. A beautifully drawn or painted face often gives way to a gaping, snarling monster ... The beauty/ugliness, or abjection, dichotomy in Mason’s work is no other than an expression of how awful pain is. Mason has also said, "All the arts are forms of play." A great deal has been written about the creative process, about the pathology which may or may not underline the need to turn play into a way of life and a means of communication." Albie Sachs

"The Man Who Sang and the Woman Who Kept Silent' (colloquially known as 'The Blue Dress'); comprising two paintings and a mixed media sculpture, have together come to constitute the signature piece of the Constitutional Court's collection. Justice Albie Sachs considers Judith Mason's "The Man who Sang and the Woman who kept Silent" (1998) to be "one of the great pieces of art in the world of the late 20th century"

This piece was inspired by two stories Mason heard on the radio at the time of the Truth and Reconciliation hearings. They told of the execution of two liberation movement cadres by the security police. One was Harold Sefola, who as Mason relates, "asked permission to sing Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika" before he was electrocuted; the other was Phila Ndwandwe, "who was tortured and kept naked for ten days" and then assassinated in a kneeling position. As the TRC found, before Ndwandwe was killed, she "fashioned a pair of panties for herself out of a scrap of blue plastic." This moved Mason to make a dress of blue plastic bags, inscribed with text beginning: "Sister, a plastic bag may not be the whole armour of God, but you were wrestling with flesh and blood, and against powers, against the rulers of darkness …"

"I paint in order to make sense of my life, to manipulate various chaotic fragments of information and impulse into some sort of order, through which I can glimpse a hint of meaning. I am an agnostic humanist possessed of religious curiosity who regards making artworks as akin to alchemy. To use inert matter on an inert surface to convey real energy and presence seems to me a magical and privileged way of living out my days". Judith Mason, 2004

"Hyenas like artists, are scavengers prowling on the edge of society. I love hyaenas because of their other-worldly whooping, their ungainliness and their "bad hair" (I share the latter two characteristics). I also regard the animal as a very apt image of the 'id' in opposition to the ego and the super-ego, the monkey on my back. In the three lithographs I have depicted The Muse by Day as a Hyaena in guinea fowl's clothing, the spots as disguise or drag to celebrate the gift of mimicry. In the Muse by Night I have concentrated on the animal as far-seeing, seer-like with the coat of spots as shaman's eyes. In Muse Amused I have tried to celebrate a generally despised animal having an existential guffaw." Judith Mason, 2006

Exhibitions

She has exhibited frequently in South Africa, with works in all the major South African art collections as well as in private and public collections in Europe and the United States. She has held exhibitions in Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, Chile, West Germany, Switzerland and the USA.

Major public commissions include: The Man Who Sang and The Woman Who Kept Silent aka The Blue Dress at the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg, South Africa. Several large tapestries in collaboration with Marguerite Stephens and stained-glass window designs for the Great Park Synagogue in Johannesburg. In 2008, from 2 October to 6 December 2008, the Standard Bank Gallery in Johannesburg, South Africa hosted a major retrospective of paintings, drawings, assemblage, installations, artists books and essays. Sasol Art Museum at the University of Stellenbosch installed the same retrospective titled: A Prospect of Icons from 14 January to 28 March 2009. Her first solo exhibition was at Gallery 101, Johannesburg, in 1964 after winning second prize in the U.A.T competition in 1963. Mason has exhibited regularly in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria, Stellenbosch, Mpumalanga and George. Goodman Gallery, Chelsea Gallery, Association of Arts Pretoria, Association of Arts Cape Town, Hout Street Gallery, Strydom Gallery, Dorp Street Gallery, Art on Paper, Karen Mackerron Gallery, as well as lithographs, oil paintings and drawings at Ombondi Gallery in New York in 1990 and more recently, lithographs at Art Basel Miami Beach 2010 and 2015. She represented South Africa at the Venice Biennale, 1966, São Paulo Biennale 1973, Brazil, Valparaiso Biennale 1979, Chile and Houston Arts Festival 1980, USA.

Publications

Select Collections in South Africa

Select Collections Abroad

Personal life

Was married to Professor Revil John Mason, former head of the Archaeology Department University of the Witwatersrand, with two daughters, Tamar Mason (1966) and Petra Mason (1970).

References

  1. ↑ Temin, Christine (1999) "The art of truth and healing after apartheid, South African artists reflect the difficult past and challenging future", Boston Globe, 3 January 1991, p. C3
  2. ↑ http://www.art.co.za/judithmason/

External links

  1. judithmason
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