Jack Ginsberg Centre for the Book Arts


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Johandi du Plessis

Bloemfontein

SCRAPE. MELT. REPEAT: LEARNER'S DRIVER'S ACCIDENT (2014)

Type of book work: Unique / sculptural book-object (one-of-a-kind)
Dimensions: 210 x 148
Media: Hand bound book, beeswax, plastic, photocopied and digitally manipulated temporary driver's license document

Artist's / designer's statements

The work explores identity in terms of language, memory, preservation and temporality. The process of book-making is suggested with the absence of the flyleafs, cover and spine of the book.

BOUND (2015)

Type of book work: Unique / sculptural book-object (one-of-a-kind)
Dimensions: 65 x 370 x 260
Media: Resin, human hair, synthetic hair, clay, oil paint

Artist's / designer's statements

'Bound' explores the relationship between identity and hair; natural and artificial; and preservation and decay.

Johandi du Plessis is a Junior Lecturer in Drawing, Painting and Installation and Sculpture at the Department of Fine Arts, University of the Free State, and is currently busy with her Masters in Fine Arts. Du Plessis received her BA Fine Arts from the University of the Free State in 2014 in Installation and Sculpture.

Du Plessis' art research involves an interdisciplinary approach, intermixing art with science, sociology and design. Her work stretches across various media, which almost always culminates into large installations, typically including artist books, sculptural, video, drawing and photographic material. Her research process is essential, inasmuch that her art-making process itself becomes inseparable from the work.

Artist

Education

2011-2014 BA Fine Arts (distinction in Installation and Sculpture), University of the Free State, South Africa.
2010-2011 B. Arch Stud Foundational Year, University of the Free State, South Africa.

Awards

2016 Selected as one of fourteen of South Africa's most promising emerging and mid-career artists to partake in the experimental and interdisciplinary OPENLab Arts Residency, Bloemfontein and Modern Art Projects, Richmond, University of the Free State, South Africa.
2014 Award for best student in third year for Fine Arts, University of the Free State, South Africa.
2013 Award for best student in Sculpture in Fine Arts, University of the Free State, South Africa.
2012 Merit award for No Student Hungry artwork, University of the Free State, South Africa.

Exhibitions

2016 District Six 50th Commemoration Print Exchange, The District Six Museum, Cape Town, South Africa.
2016 Phatshoane Henney New Breed, Bloemfontein, Oliewenhuis Art Museum, South Africa.
2016 Otherwise Group Exhibition: 30 Contemporary South African Artists, Sosesame Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa.
2016 Sasol New Signatures Top 100: discovering South Africa's emerging artists, Pretoria, Pretoria Art Museum, South Africa.
2015 Absa l'Atelier Top 100, Absa Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa

Collections

2016 Seeds of Success (2014), Modern Art Projects, Richmond, South Africa.