Doyenne of the South African classic art world Bettie Cilliers-Barnard celebrates her 93rd birthday as Personality of the Week on Radio2000's BravoBrava.
International Dialing Tel : (+2712) 460 3337
E-mail: mailto:artspta@mweb.co.za
Born in Rustenburg, Transvaal on November 18, 1914. Since 1946 Dr Ciliers-Barnard’s works have been shown in seventy solo exhibitions in South Africa as well as in Paris (paintings 1956), London (graphic art 1971), and at the Prestiges Invitation Exh ibition at the Taipei Fine Arts museum in Taiwan (painting and graphic art 1987)
She has represented South Africa at a number of international Exhibitions some of which include the Xie Grand Prix International d’Art Contemporian de Monte Carlo in Monaco, 1977, the Vth International Biennale for Graphic Art in Italy, the Gulbennkai an Exhibition in Portugal, 1968, the Venice Biennale, 1956 and 1964, and the Sao Paulo Biennale, 1957, 1959, 1961 and 1963.
Her South African graphic art exhibitions abroad have included Austria, Germany, Spain, Greece and Israel to name a few. Her tapestries, paintings, and murals in oils have been commissioned both for public collections and for museum- and private colle ctions in South Africa and abroad. Most recently in 1992 she painted "Vision" for the Pretoria Eye Institute and some of her other commissions including the painting "Flight" for South African Airways, 1983, the tapestry "Guardian Angel of the Arts" for t he State Theatre of Pretoria, 1981, and her mural in oils "Mensa sana corpore sano" for the Department of Health in Pretoria, 1980.
AWARDS
1966
Dr Cilliers-Barnard received her first artistic award when she was presented a Gold Medal for Painting from the Transvaal Academy.
1978
An Honorary Award for Painting from the South African Academy for Science and Art
1983
The State President’s Decoration for Meritorious Service
1985
A Chancellor’s Medal from the University of Pretoria
1988
A Commemorative Medal of Honour from the American Biographical Institute
1988
Was granted a full membership in the South African Academy for Science and Arts
1991
Receive a Prestige Award for Painting from the Federation of South African Culture.
1991
An Honorary Doctorate (D Phil) was awarded by the University of Potchefstroom
1999
An Honorary Doctorate (D Litt et Phil) from RAU University
Two retrospective exhibitions of her work followed: Pretoria Art Museum 1995 and the SASOL Art Museum 1996. A book on the life and work of Bettie Cilliers-Barnard, by the Art Historian Prof Muller Ballot, was launched in 1996.
He says the following about her work:
The artist’s current period of consolidated themes stems from the principle of joining and linking all kinds of existing and new motifs. In this way new contexts and new content are created. There is at l east one central message which appears in the works of this period. This is certainly related to the artist’s serious search for a reconciliation of earthly and transcendental perspectives on human existence. Her reaching out to esoteric horizons, to the boundaries of time and space, which have fascinated her from an early stage, still seeks fulfilment in the symbolic values of the human figure. Sometimes these occur with, for example, strange alien beings, primeval animal forms, arrows and sharp triangul ar shapes.
To mark the celebration of her 90th birthday - three years ago, the famed artist Bettie Cilliers-Barnard held an exhibition of her then recent paintings, which she called Colour as Language, in the Mackie Street Gallery of the Association of Arts Pretoria. The exhibition was opened on Sunday 7 November by Professor Muller Ballot, author of the book on the life and work of the artist which was published in 1996, the second edition of which is on sale at all major book stores.
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