Pascale Chandler

'Wounded tread of gentle souls'

Pascale Chandler

Wounded tread of gentle souls

Oil on canvas

63 x 196cm

Chandler's intention in this work is to raise the  issue of censorship of art works, as well as to look at the function of the creative process in public (social) spaces. It makes specific reference to the censorship of Andries Botha's Three Elephants public sculpture in the Warwick Junction - Durban.

Link to the controversial censorship issue - Mail & Guardian

Central to this controversy - Chandler says - is "a collision of power and multiple egos traded as particular perspectives on social identity".

This raises questions of social identity within our own Durban (eThekwini) environment. Who are we? How do we react to others? What right do we have to impose our views on others - or others on us? What differences in power exist around us? What other collisions of values have you experienced?

Chandler says that "The painting explores (a) metaphorical sombre space where a sinister machine secretly shifts a mass of debris." The debris are the carcasses of the sculpture which Chandler says 'has been held hostage by the eThekwini Municipality." The colours that Chandler uses (dark grey/blues) and their loose application suggests a sombre sad Durban with the identifying horizontal bank of the Bluff in the far background.

The bright orange 'sinister' machine contrasts strongly with these grey/blues and suggests power as it seems to emerge from the sea in pursuit of the scared elephant on the right. The long thin shape of the canvas format could suggest a moment in time in a long narrative.

The title of the painting is extremely evocative. Wounded tread of gentle souls.

It suggests that there is a bigger issue at stake here - that of the elephants themselves and their endangered status in our country. This is the intention of the original Botha sculpture as commissioned by the Human Elephant Foundation. www.humanelephant.org

Link to interview  

Did you know that elephants used to walk down to Durban Bay to wallow in the mud?

Link to Elephants in Durban

“Andries Botha and the municipality have agreed that Botha will complete the sculpture of a small herd of elephants at Warwick Junction on the original site,” Photo from M&G

(All quotes are from the artist’s statement - Exhibition catalogue)

Activity for class:

Issues of social identity - 'Us' and 'Them' discussions as a visual dialogue.

Think of a metaphor for YOU or for something you value. (You can’t use a ‘selfie’ ...... that’s literal, not metaphorical!) Do the same for a ‘sinister’ other. What happens between them? Create a visual image in any medium that explores a moment in time in your story / narrative.

Possible NCS curricular themes:

3. Socio-political art - including resistance art of the 1970s and 1980s(??)

6. Post-democratic Identity in south Africa  (including issues of language, ethnicity, globalization, urbanization  in the new South Africa)