FORMED
Solo Exhibition, CIRCA | Everard Read, 2024
2 Jellicoe Ave, Rosebank, Johannesburg, 2196
11 April - 25 May 2024
This collection of Lionel Smit's paintings and bronze sculptures opens on the 12th of April 2024.
Formed: Lionel Smit's Exploration of Shape and Essence
He has been one of South Africa’s most popular painters and sculptors for decades, but Lionel Smit is not resting on his laurels. For an award-winning master of his craft, he’s refreshingly modest and open abouthis art and practice.
His focus on sculpture for this new exhibition, Formed, is case in point. Smit has been producing the latter for years, but for this body of work, he has upped the ante. “Usually, I predominantly paint, but I’d gone into anew process of trying to sculpt more frequently. I got into a rhythm of sculpting and that’s when the wholeidea of shaping something in a three-dimensional form, from a painter's point of view, became intriguing”, he says.
After hard hours of work, the result is a series of heads and busts, and for the first time, full figures, made in his quintessential abstracted style. It’s these forms, and indeed the forming of them, that give the show itspolysemous title. Smit has also put the emphasis on the pause in the moment of how a piece is modelled.“That’s the essence of what I've tried to capture”, he explains. There are a handful of paintings in the exhibition, but they very much complement and foreground his bronzes.
The movement, markings, and shapes that he has fashioned in clay and then cast in bronze are evocativeof the energy-filled brush strokes that bring the women in his paintings to life. They also illustrate Smit’sprofound understanding of both the evolution of art and its artistry. There is something of the AncientGreek, of Michelangelo, and of hours spent grappling with human anatomy in his latest beauties. The Contrapposto poses and the hesitation over whether a fragmented figure is still being built up or in the process of decaying, are there too.
“I loved it, but it was also terrifying”, Smit says candidly of this new direction. “I think I had the armature in my studio for two years before I started working. I had to gather the stamina and confidence to be able to do it”, he adds. He started with the smaller figures and that led him to an understanding of form and shape that he couldthen transfer into larger pieces.
It’s this sense of the craft and of his developing his skill that Smit would like his audience to engage with. Ashe puts it, “I hope it makes them reflect on the process of sculpture and the idea of how things are formed and shaped. From both spatial and making points of view, I think people will get a completely different idea each time they look at the works”.
Formed runs from 12 April 2024 at Everard Read Johannesburg’s CIRCA Gallery. For more information about the exhibition, contact Gina Mollé at gina@everard.co.za
CIRCA | Everard Read, Johannesburg
Established in 1913, Everard Read is the leading gallery for modern and contemporary art from South Africa. They are Africa’s oldest gallery representing South African artists with an authentic and considered practice from diverse backgrounds. Their galleries are home to world-class exhibitions of artists across a variety of media and genres, from a wide-ranging group of South African artists and artist estates. Everard Read has seven distinct galleries in four locations - Cape Town, Johannesburg, London and Franschhoek - all optimised to accommodate the breadth of their artists’ creations and envisaged as oases for the communities they serve.
In 2009, the CIRCA building was developed alongside the gallery. CIRCA, which is supported by Rand Merchant Bank, has been internationally recognised as an outstanding contribution to South African architecture. Within the subtle curved walls of CIRCA, a series of profound and powerful exhibitions have already been held. The curatorial directors seek to intersperse contemporary art exhibitions with human technology and scientific installations.
For inquiries at CIRCA | Everard Read:
gina@everard.co.za
+27 (0)11 788 4805
2 Jellicoe Avenue Johannesburg, 2196
Opening hours:
Monday to Friday: 9am to 5pm
Saturday: 9am to 1pm
Please note the Gallery is closed on public holidays.
Formed, a solo exhibition by Lionel Smit
12 April - 25 May 2024