Jack Ginsberg Centre for the Book Arts


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Maureen De Jager

Grahamstown

THE HONOUR BOOK (2017)

Type of book work: Editioned / printed work
Dimensions: 250 x 190 x 70
Media: Hand-bound book with clasp (bovine leather, paper, Eska board and copper)

Artist's / designer's statements

A hand-bound book with off-white leather cover, rounded spine, gilded edges, and copper clasp; in a limited edition of 4 sets with 1 artist's proof. Bound by Heléne van Aswegen.

The Honour Book comprises a series of macro-lens photographs of the word 'honour', as this appears in record WO 105/5 - a box of war reports concerning the South African War (UK Archives). The book resembles a leather-bound bible (with gilded edges and decorative clasp), but as one pages, the 'honour' images become redder and redder, eventually morphing into blood. Embossed on the back cover is a quote by Cecil John Rhodes: '…if there be a God, I think that what he would like me to do is paint as much of the map of Africa British red as possible…'

WO 32/8061 [THE BOOK OF HOLES] (2016)

Type of book work: Editioned / printed work
Dimensions: 220 x 180 x 100
Media: Hand-bound book, cotton gloves, handcrafted paper knife, solander box

Artist's / designer's statements

A hand-bound book with uncut pages, in a solander box with accompanying objects, comprising a limited edition of 4 with 1 artist's proof. Printed and bound by Heléne van Aswegen.

WO 32/8061 [The Book of Holes] features 172 sequential photographs, collated into a book with uncut pages, documenting the punch holes indiscriminately made in record WO 32/8061 - a collection of reports on the South African War held in the UK National Archives. Specifically, the photographs track the path of a treasury tag feeding into these haphazard holes, and the proximate sites of wounding. A link is thus suggested between the damage described in the reports, the damage of the punch-holes, and the wounding act of reading: because the pages of the book are uncut, accessing the contents necessitates violence.

Artist / Academic

Education

Currently undertaking PhD in Fine Art, Kingston University, United Kingdom
2000 Master of Arts in Fine Arts (with distinction), University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.
1996 Bachelor of Arts in Fine Arts (with distinction), University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.

Awards

2012 Artist in Residence for Visual Art, National Arts Festival.
2010 Finalist, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum Biennial Exhibition and Award.

Recent exhibitions

2013 Dialogues 2013. 5 June - 16 June, Orangerie Exhibition Çenter of the French Senate, 15 Rue de Vaugirard.
2014 Maria's story, 8 May - 22 June, The Reservoir, Oliewenhuis Art Museum, Bloemfontein.
2014 Site: photography and national trauma in South Africa. 8 October - 1 November, Gallery University Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch.
2014 Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum Biennial Exhibition. 29 October 2014 - February 2015, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum, Port Elizabeth.
2016 Research in Focus. 13 June - 20 June, Platform Gallery, Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Kingston University, London.

Collections

2006 and 2007 Absa
2014 Oliewenhuis Art Museum
2014 Boer War Museum
2014 Jack Ginsberg