KIM SACKS GALLERY

FROM THE TABLE - TO THE WALL AND BACK AGAIN

2011-09-18T23:08:00.000+02:00

2011-09-18T22:55:00.000+02:00

FROM THE TABLE - TO THE WALL AND BACK AGAIN

2011-09-18T22:48:00.000+02:00

In the next week - I will be posting a whole host of images of Clementina's new work for her exhibition opening at my gallery on the 1st of October 2011. I have been looking forward to this show - with excitement - I think - once again Tina is going to re-invent herself - and make magic and enchantment. I love the way the gallery changes it's persona - and becomes something so different. We are going to paint the main wall bright green..... and all in all - it proves to be most wonderful.....

IMAGES FROM AROUND THE GALLERY TODAY

2011-02-16T23:13:00.004+02:00

Wednesday 16th February 2011

I spent yesterday in the gallery -
and decided to take a whole lot of images
of new pieces that have arrived recently.

I hope that these images give some insight as to
what is in the gallery at the moment - and the wonderful
variety of Extra-Ordinary Objects
that I have the privilege of being able to work with
on a daily basis........

2010-11-19T16:49:00.001+02:00

Ethnographica
Contemporary Design
Fine Craft
Folk and Tribal Art

Exhibitions and exclusive dealers in museum quality Textiles - Ceramics - Baskets - Beadwork - Furniture and Wood Carvings from every corner of the African Continent.

Phone Gallery for opening times.

We are also open by appointment after hours and we welcome export enquiries.

153 Jan Smuts Avenue
Parkwood
Johannesburg
Gauteng
South Africa
Tel: +27 11 447 5804
Fax: +27 11 442 5571
Cell: 083 377 7499
email: kim@kimsacksgallery.com

2010-03-05T13:26:00.004+02:00

My View: Made By Hand in Black and White
Robyn Sassen

Robyn Sassen: A cow lies on her side, grinning through blackened lips, her tail a switch of straw. She sets the tone for this extraordinary show of fine craft.

Made of Mpengende wood from KwaZulu-Natal, butter-like in colour and smoothness, by Sibusiso Gumede and Widus Mtshali, this cow's one of the delightful treasures in this wonderland exhibition of some of the finest craft you can imagine, from this continent.

Turning away from the cow, you're assailed by the gaze of a similarly made meerkat, with a lizard-like creature in its mouth, front paws outstretched to you beseechingly. But then the bolshiness and seamlessness of Ian Garrett's pots, sensitive derivations on the traditional Zulu beer pot, shout to you with their utter technical perfection.

The engaging insanity of a nest of wholly impractical tea accoutrements, from cups and saucers on spindly legs to teapots evoking buildings, by architect-turned-potter Carolyn Heydenrych, will turn your head and grab the focus of your tea parties. This potter has also made paper-thin vessels: there're drawings on them in black-on initial careless perusal, these nervous, scratchy images evoke those in Madeline, children's books published from 1939 and written and illustrated by Ludwig Bemelmans. But no: there are naked women's bodies on them, mad and witty in their ambiguous directness. As you look at them, other Zulu beer pots-ones by Jabu Nala-nudge the corner of your eye. They are beautifully satisfying in their perfection, they nourish your soul by dint of their simple presence.

Lisa Firer presents breath-haltingly spectacular porcelain bowls. They're made of small quadrangular flat pieces of white clay, layered upon themselves. The work is so delicate, it seems as though a careless breath would dissolve them, sending each stamp-sized piece of fine clay into the spirit world from where she retrieved them: the work holds your eye with the same kind of "look at me" insistence that you'd hear from a magnificent piece of lace.

Playing delicately and innovatively with the interface between black and white lines is a large series of diversely shaped vessels by Madoda Fani. They stand above a veritable herd of beaded Monkeybiz creatures, hilariously bovine in their glance and gesture, in black and white, but for an odd muzzle or eyeball in red. Then there are embroidered scatter cushions, bolts and bolts of Malian mud-cloth, dyed with a world famous resist technique, developed in this ancient land-locked repository of desert values by the Dogon people, with bold geometry characteristic of the culture.

From tiny crocheted whorls, threaded together to form table- or bodily decoration, to great big pots made of coils of carefully moulded mud, to commercially printed bags by the plenty, mounted on the arched wall of the gallery, to the myriad of tea cups, jugs, saucers and bowls, with walls thick and thin, in black and white, and surprising and delicious combinations of the two, this is an utterly wonderfully cluttered exhibition, which pays no heed to the modernist values of the white cube gallery space. Eleven years in this space, Kim Sacks still manifests one of the best sets of eyes and sensibilities for recognising beautiful work from all over this continent, as close to perfection as possible. The show deliciously reeks of committed work ethic and will enable you to begin your year on the kind of adrenalin rush that comes of owning something you will love forever.

Exhibition: "Made by Hand in Black and White: An exhibition of Fine Craft" (Kim Sacks Gallery, Rosebank, 011 447 5804).
Artists: Over 40 ceramicists, embroiderers, photographers, wood carvers, fabric dyers, crocheters and makers of beautiful objects.
Until: January 22.

Robyn Sassen
info@frodo.co.za
011 886 0162
084 319 7844

Robyn Sassen started grown-up life as a printmaker, got seduced by the idea of making drawings on plywood, and then shifted paradigmatically from wood to words. She has degrees from Wits and Unisa and currently freelances as an arts journalist and academic. A perfectionist and one who enjoys a catholic taste in literature and music, Robyn has an insatiable passion for cryptic crossword puzzles, complicated knitting patterns, her Art Deco coffee table, with which she shares her flat in Johannesburg and an etching press in Grahamstown called 'Wilfred'.

She has been writing on the arts since the early 1990s, beginning with academic book reviews and diversifying into reviewing the performed and visual arts when she started freelancing for the SA Jewish Report at its inception in 1998. Today, Robyn works as the Arts Editor for the SA Jewish Report. She also writes for a range of electronic and print platforms, with an arts-specific focus, including Art South Africa. She was regional editor for Artthrob between 2002 and 2004 and maintained a monthly column on Popmatters.com between 2001 and 2004. In 2005, Robyn was shortlisted for the Arts and Culture Trust Arts Journalist of the Year Award. She was a judge for the Naledi Theatre Awards between 2004 and 2007. Since 2006, Robyn has been contributing to Cue newspaper, the Grahamstown National Arts Festival daily publication. In 2008 she was invited to be a judge for the Gauteng MEC Awards for Dance and Choreography.

Robyn also freelances as an academic, specialising in teaching South African contemporary art history and theory at several South African universities. She continues to keep up with her interest in printmaking, and was one of the delegates at Impact V, an international biennial conference in printmaking, held in Tallinn, Estonia, in 2007, and will be a delegate at Impact VI, in Bristol, United Kingdom, in 2009.

Black & White Exhibition

2009-11-14T10:07:00.013+02:00

MADE
BY HAND
IN
BLACK
AND
WHITE

KIM SACKS GALLERY

An Exhibition of Fine Craft.

Preview: Saturday Morning 21st of November, 2009 – at 10a.m.
Opening: Saturday Afternoon 2.30 p.m.
A Walk-About and Discussion with some of the Makers will take place.
Refreshments will be served.
Exhibition Closes on the 22nd of January 2010.

CERAMICS
CHRISTINA BRYER – ELKE MARTENS – HEATHER MILLS
HENNIE MEYER - CLEMENTINA VAN DER WALT – IAN GARRETT – JOHN NEWDIGATE – JABU NALA
KIM SACKS – JANICE RABIE – HELEN VAUGHAN – LISA FIRER – NICOLENE C. SWANEPOEL – PAUL DE JONGH
MADODA FANI - CAROLYN HEYDENRYCH – SHELLEY MAISEL – POTTER’S WORKSHOP
LOREN KAPLAN – DOREEN HEMP – JENNIFER BOND – KATHERINE GLENDAY

PHOTOGRAPHY
DEREK MCKENZIE

PAPER WORKS
CATHY VELS STANLEY

WOOD
ALLAN SCHWARZ
"MEZIMBITE"

TEXTILES
FROM WEST AFRICA
MUD-CLOTH – MALI
WHITE WOVEN CLOTHS – MOSSI – BURKINA FASO
KHWE HAND - PRINTED TEXTILES

BEADWORK

MONKEYBIZ
TRADITIONAL AFRICAN PIECES FROM THE CONTINENT
BEADED COPPER WIRE BASKETS AND EGGS

DESIGNER JEWELLERY

WIRE BASKETS

WOVEN BASKETS

VINA NDWANDWE
NTOMBI MHLONGO

CROCHETED TOYS AND CREATURES

The Gallery is open Monday to Friday 9am - 5pm
Saturday 10 am to 5 pm
And any other time by appointment - and with great pleasure!

Secure parking on the Property
Phone the gallery for opening times...
Telephones: (011) 447-5804 - Mobile: 083-377 9076
After-hours number 27-11-726-6420 (emergencies only)

153 JAN SMUTS AVENUE - PARKWOOD
JOHANNESBURG

THE WORK ON THIS EXHIBITION WILL ALSO BE AVAILABLE TO CLIENTS WHO
ARE NOT ABLE TO VISIT THE
GALLERY IN PERSON - THROUGH E-MAIL - BY REQUEST
GALLERY ALSO OFFERS A COMPREHENSIVE SHIPPING SERVICE
TO CLIENTS WHO DO NOT RESIDE IN JOHANNESBURG

Kim Sacks School of Ceramics Blogspot:
www.kimsacksschoolofceramics.blogspot.com

2009-07-21T15:08:00.010+03:00

Clementina Van Der Walt Exhibition

- Still on at the Gallery -

- due to public demand -
all exhibition pieces will still be in the gallery
until the end of August

2009-07-21T15:05:00.003+03:00

The shape of things

A journey in clay

We are all patchwork,
And
so shapeless and diverse in composition
that each moment,
plays it’s own game.
And there is as much difference
between us and ourselves
As between
Us and others

Michel de montainge, Essais, Second book 1.

I constantly hear people saying
that the world as we know it
is changing and that it will never be the same…

~~~~~~~~

I personally feel that it is changing all the time –
it has never been static for any of us .

I have been thinking about the notion of
How things take on shapes –
the forms that exist
For certain things – in fact for all things
How they come to be like that – and if they should
continue that way or mutate to follow a
different set of functions
And I feel inclined to look at this More closely –
and in the context of working with clay
looking at what we choose to construct
how we make those choices
and what path we choose to follow our creative
inclinations.

clay

is a tremendous material
that one must learn to love
And believe in if it is to open itself for one;

A curious material who’s qualities lie in physics and chemistry have not yet been fully explored.
Working with it requires imagination.

The Chinese and Persians, who perhaps reached the
Greatest heights in ceramics, were poets and dreamers in clay. The Chinese kept 1000 kilns firing in 1000 cities
For 1000 years. They followed the path of experience and patience and finally knew all there was to
Know about clay. They enveloped ceramics in poetry,
Inscribed upon it as an ingenious world of symbols.
Even the most exalted god, t ao, took up
Residence in their vases.

Axel salto

I WOULD LIKE TO INVITE YOU TO
JOIN ME ON A CLAY JOURNEY
FOR THE NEXT 3 MONTHS

For these 12 weeks –
we will explore the History of the Shape of that each of us each of us – finds most inspiring in our daily lives
Examine the journey that the chosen shape
Has taken through history –
and how we can make and
construct these beloved shapes
in a way that we resonate with personally

How we go about designing and creating shapes that inspire and define our lives and the way we live them.

Objects that are Personal and Ceremonial
The difference between the two, and
How we distinguish between them.

We will research – and test
alternative materials – and how they function in the clay we have chosen to work with.
We will continue to explore and push the boundaries of red, white, buff, black AND BROWN clays.
We will continue with our research and testing of found materials from our travels.

–
translucent and opaque surfaces –
being fired at different temperatures…
how they resonate with each other –
and with our own creative spirits –
In choosing what “Clay-Bodies” we work with –
We become Alchemists….
We Play, We Dance, We make Magic with the clay-
and in turn
Re-create and give shape to
Our world and our universe…

Contact kim sacks for further information
Regarding clay journeys
(011) 726-6420 – kimsacks@gmail.com

2009-07-21T14:32:00.005+03:00

PIECES BY CAROLYN HEYDENRYCH

Porcelain Magic

2009-06-11T14:37:00.011+03:00

KIM SACKS GALLERY

CLEMENTINA

VAN DER WALT

KIM SACKS GALLERY

REQUESTS THE PLEASURE OF YOUR COMPANY

AT THE OPENING OF AN EXHIBITION OF

RECENT CERAMIC WORKS

CLEMENTINA VAN DER WALT

OPENING: SATURDAY 20thJUNE 2009 -10am – 5pm

PREVIEW: FRIDAY 19^TH JUNE 2009 – 10am – 5pm

THERE WILL BE A DISCUSSION

AND

“A WALK-ABOUT”

WITH CLEMENTINA AT 3 PM

ON THE DAY THE EXHIBITION OPENS

REFRESHMENTS WILL BE SERVED

The Gallery is open Monday to Friday 9am-5pm

Saturday 10am to 5 pm

And any other time by appointment – and with great pleasure!

Secure parking on the Property

Phone the gallery for opening times…

Telephones: (011) 447-5804 – Mobile: 083-3779076

After-hours number 27-11-726-6420 (emergencies only)

153 JAN SMUTS AVENUE – PARKWOOD

JOHANNESBURG

THE WORK ON THIS EXHIBITION WILL ALSO BE AVAILABLE TO CLIENTS WHO ARE NOT ABLE TO VISIT THE GALLERY IN PERSON - THROUGH E-MAIL – BY REQUEST.

GALLERY ALSO OFFERS A COMPREHENSIVE SHIPPING

ALTERNATIVE TO CLIENTS WHO DO NOT RESIDE IN JOHANNESBURG.

EXHIBITION CLOSES ON SATURDAY 11^th July – 2009.

Clementina Van der Walt's platters, bowls and cups serve as objects both for use and for contemplation. Ceramic objects are intimate ones that enter our space. They are touched by hand and lip as well as eye and mind. They underscore the ritualistic understanding of ordinary daily activities. As such they are understood (and critically assessed) in terms of their own definition. A central theme in this discourse is tactility. A repulsive surface, rough and harsh, repels. So too does heaviness, an aspect that contradictorily can be assessed with the eye. Van der Walt's ceramics do not fail in this respect. They seduce with the invitation to touch their buttery surfaces inflected here and there with a splash of red, the colour of ox blood. Textures are played off each other, the smooth gloss interior of a plate where the food is to rest is set against the matt surface of the rim - sufficiently rough to speak of baked earth but not coarse enough to repel the hand. Van der Walt demonstrates her mastery of the medium. Her forms are free formed but unforced. They are lyrical and light. They make reference to the African cultural and physical landscape in the play of colour - a dark brown of wet earth against the ochre of burnt veldt; the khaki of grass against the white of cloud, and always the grace note of that wonderful ox blood red. Occasionally an African motif appears transmogrified into her personal decorative language

Living on the southern tip of the African continent means that the African way is often evoked and idealised. A favourite riposte in the debate over art and utilitarian craft forms is to fall back on the argument that art in Africa was never divorced from practical and ritual practices in traditional societies. 'It is all art', so the argument goes. However, this point tends to idealise 'traditional' African society and entirely discounts the fact that much African art nowadays is made for collector and tourist markets. It also assumes that the only discourse surrounding ceramics is that of utility. This argument is intended to foreclose further debate, which contradictorily needs to be broken wide open if ceramics is not to fall beneath the radar of critical attention. Van der Walt's mask/vases pose questions that do not arise in relation to her studio ceramics, which are more comfortably positioned in ceramic practice. But when studio ceramics enters the art market in the collector's domain - and clearly this is where van der Walt's ceramics are positioned - it behoves us to interrogate the interface between contemporary ceramics and contemporary art, however unfashionable this cross-examination might be. Van der Walt's experimental work is located on the boundary of ceramic and sculptural discourses. It raises issues of just how we see and assess ceramics. Her superlative exhibition brings into question debates that we are generally more comfortable in ignoring.

WILMA CRUISE

2009-04-15T20:50:00.004+02:00

New Acquisitions in the Gallery

2009-03-31T11:28:00.007+02:00

Porcelain Plates by Christina Bryer

Lindelani Ngwenya

2009-03-03T16:57:00.005+02:00

Copper Wire Sculpture by Lindelane Ngwenya

2009-02-19T13:58:00.012+02:00

Textile Exhibition
Opening
31st Jan 09

Catherine Herbe, Marieange Burgniard & Veronique Tadjo

Danielle Vancol, Keven Friedman, Merle Friedman and Lize Yore

Lorato Liphuko & Michael Matolenywa

Irene Alexander & Engela Venter

Cristy MacCallum & Kathy Newton

Anneliese Cianfanelli

Photographs Courtesy of Cathy Thompson - Get it Magazine

2009-01-23T17:03:00.013+02:00

KIM SACKS GALLERY

AN EXHIBITION OF

TEXTILES FROM

THE AFRICAN CONTINENT

Fante Kuba Dida Nupe Ewe Kente Indigo Fulani Mbuti Yoruba Hausa Baule Bamileke

And many more….

You are warmly invited

to the Opening of

An Exhibition of Textiles

From The African Continent

Opening on Saturday the

31st of January 2009

10am to 5pm

The exhibition will close on Saturday the 28th of February 2009

We welcome schools using this exhibition as a resource -

They are most welcome to bring their learners to visit

draw and discuss - whatever their ages are.

This is done by appointment.

KIM SACKS GALLERY

153 JAN SMUTS AVENUE PARKWOOD

JOHANNESBURG 2193

Secure parking on the premises

Opening times:

MON - FRI 09h00 - 18h00

SAT 09h30 - 17h00

SUN - 10h00 - 13h00

Gallery is also open after hours by appointment

Telephone: +27 - 11 447 5804 Fax: + 27 - 11 726-6420

Mobile: + 27- 83 3779076

E-mail: kim@kimsacksgallery.com

THE WORK ON THIS EXHIBITION WILL ALSO BE AVAILABLE TO CLIENTS WHO ARE NOT ABLE TO VISIT THE GALLERY IN PERSON - THROUGH E-MAIL BY REQUEST.

THE GALLERY ALSO OFFERS A COMPREHENSIVE SHIPPING ALTERNATIVE TO CLIENTS WHO DO NOT RESIDE IN JOHANNESBURG.

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO PASS THIS INVITATION ON TO INTERESTED PARTIES.

2009-01-15T14:46:00.002+02:00

KIM SACKS SCHOOL OF CERAMICS

JANUARY 2009

WHEEL-WORK

HAND-WORK

SCULPTURE

DECORATING AND GLAZING TECHNIQUES

CERAMIC CHEMISTRY

TRADITIONAL ZULU CERAMICS

KIM SACKS HAS BEEN WORKING WITH CLAY FOR 40 YEARS.

HER EXPERIENCE IS VAST AND VERY VARIED.

SHE HOLDS REGULAR CLASSES FOR BEGINNERS AND

ADVANCED STUDENTS – OF ALL AGES.

SHE ALSO HOLDS SPECIALIST COURSES IN VARIOUS

FIELDS OF CERAMIC INTEREST.

THE SCHOOL IS SITUATED IN A MAGICAL BUILDING

WITH EXCEPTIONAL FACILITIES –

A LIBRARY –

A COLLECTION OF OLD AFRICAN CERAMICS

MANY KILNS AND WHEELS

A CERAMIC LABORATORY

AND ENDLESS SPACE.

SHOULD YOU WISH TO DISCUSS YOUR

CERAMIC FANTASIES WITH HER

PLEASE CALL HER ON:

(011) 726-6420 – OR e-mail her:

kim@kimsacksgallery.com

2009-01-15T13:57:00.012+02:00

FORM

FUNCTION

ALCHEMY

POSSIBILITY

IF only…. I could find this little island of thought and exploration – I would go there- the desire inside me is so strong – if only for a brief moment….

TO explore the shells I find on my beach, wind my fingers around the spirals of kelp – listen to the sounds the volcanic stones make when I rub them between my fingers …… and if I wander a bit further what could I hope to find along my meanderings….. if only…….

What follows below is my response to those niggling thoughts that have been nudging for most part of 2008….

I have been trying to give shape to an impulse which has been growing inside my head for the most part of 2008 - a space for a group of like-minded people - who have a desire to explore a different part of working with clay to what they are accustomed to – to take a moment in time to do just that – explore – make – talk and create..

To deviate from the “safe” “navigated – terrain” – to a place of unknown journeys ……. To a fantastic – mythical destination – filled with wonderful fellow travellers – clay that makes one desperate with desire to dig one’s fingers in….. and …….. all the impulses we’ve had for all these years – but for so many reasons – have not found time – or given ourselves space – to follow this fantasy and it’s process ……

I have had many titles for this journey, some being as crazy as : “Looking at the tea-cup from underneath” – “a chance to explore the other…… the part of the vessel that is not seen” …..or spoken about – that is dreamed about – in far off moments of meditative thought….. the moments where we wonder about shapes – clays – pigments – textures – colours – ourselves – and how we resonate with all these things…….. but we are always running – running……. Moving – most of the time far too quickly through things……. To be able to stop – and make the shapes – that haunt our making thoughts…… even perhaps our playing thoughts – if …….

JOURNEY

What I am offering is a 12 week – three hour journey once a week . It will start in February and end in April 2009. It will take place on a Tuesday Morning from 9 – 12. You need to be sure that you can participate in of most of the journey – that would be the best. It is a chance to look at different clays – red – white – black and brown clays – translucent and opaque surfaces – being fired at different temperatures……. how they resonate with each other – and with our own creative spirits – how we choose what “Clay-Bodies” to work with – that is the ALCHEMY of the process……. The clay that holds water…… that is moist – the water that caries memories…… of the rivers that it has once been - What makes it transform – once again – into another shape…. Another process……..

The FUNCTION and FORM that the objects take – is also interesting……

whether we choose to sculpt or construct vessels – for ceremonies or for daily use – that is our personal choice – and hence becomes our journey – into the process

– and the challenges and conversations that arise and occur to us

will be the gift ..

The participants will work individually and within the group – there will be quite a lot of discussion and exploring – with words and with practical endeavour.

This process is for people who have never worked with clay and are looking to explore it as a creative process – and for people who have worked with clay and who have experience – but who would like a chance to work with a wonderful group of people – for a short moment in time…… and from there – explore alternative conversations with other materials.

………So it will be like taking a ride – having creative encounters and interactions with one’s self and with a group of people and then stepping back – and reflecting.

It will be about how we fire the pieces we make – or if we fire them at all…. All that and so much more…….. and maybe just that – and no more.

If this interests you –

Please call Kim at (011) 726-6420 –

to discuss your thoughts and your pre-occupations --

– and to register – should you feel inclined.

The group will not be large – but will be adequate to create an environment that challenges and enthralls, who will make this journey?

I hope it will be something worth making………

Embroidery Exhibition

2008-11-27T13:57:00.017+02:00

EMBROIDERY

The Pursuit of Dreaming in Thread

29th November 08 - 15th January 09

KIM SACKS GALLERY

REQUESTS THE PLEASURE OF YOUR COMPANY
TO VIEW A COLLECTION OF MAGICAL EMBROIDERIES

Detail of Hand Embroidered Framed Textile

Embroidered Key rings and Christmas Decorations

Embroidered Cushions

Detail of Cushion Cover

Detail of Embroidered Wall Hanging

Detail of Wall Hanging

Safety Pin Constructed Textile