Strauss & co - 8 - 11 November 2020

112 ARTISTS AND THE NAMIBIAN LANDSCAPE T O P L A C E A B I D C L I C K O N T H E R E D L O T N U M B E R 877 Maud Sumner SOUTH AFRICAN 1902–1985 A Ship at Anchor off the Namib Coast signed oil on canvas 49 by 98 cm R100 000 – 150 000 878 Erik Laubscher SOUTH AFRICAN 1927–2013 Namib Woestyn signed and dated 76; signed and inscribed with the title on the reverse oil on canvas 63,5 by 90,5 cm R350 000 – 500 000 Artists and the Namibian Landscape The Namibian landscape has profoundly inspired artists for far more than 100 years, but as these artworks are rarely seen together, their impact, splendour and importance have been overlooked in recent years. The country’s expansive natural beauty captivated a large and eminent group of painters who lived and worked in Namibia, as well as a diverse array of South African artists. German-born Namibian artist Adolph Jentsch travelled widely in Namibia, producing a remarkable body of detailed and dazzling landscapes, although large-scale oil paintings by this artist are rare as the majority were lost when the barn they were stored in was destroyed by fire in 1975. Other notable Namibian artists include Fritz Krampe, Johannes Blatt, Axel Eriksson and Otto Schröder. The Namibian landscape, with its uninterrupted horizons, dramatic shadows, pristine isolation and, most memorably, its rare, startling light, left a deep impression on South African landscape artist JH Pierneef, who visited the country in 1923 and again in 1924, and Maud Sumner, who was entranced by what she found when she first visited in the mid-1960s. Her extensive oil and watercolour paintings demonstrate her sensitivity to and appreciation of the inimitable landscape, particularly the Namib desert. These paintings are renowned for their subtly modulated colour fields and are considered the finest work of her last years as an active artist. Few artists have captured the haunted isolation of abandoned desert towns more dramatically than Keith Alexander. He first visited the ghost towns in southern Namibia in 1980 and this intense encounter gave new impetus and direction to his work. Other South African artists who fell under the spell of the breathtaking Namib include Erik Laubscher, Gordon Vorster, Fleur Ferri, Otto Klar and Nico Roos. PROVENANCE Acquired from the artist by Professor Andre Brink. Private Collection. PROVENANCE Strauss & Co, Cape Town, 8 October 2009, lot 283. Private Collection. 877 878