PRESS RELEASE
SWAIN HOOGERVORST: Tomorrow
Jun 12 – Jul 6, 2024
Everard Read Cape Town is pleased to present Tomorrow, a solo exhibiton by Swain Hoogervorst.
“Without this mental image of tomorrow, we are incapable of life.” Gerhard Richter
This show is an homage to my grandmother. She is slowly passing away.
Flowers have become a subject that acts as a catalyst for my painterly exploration. I had already started this body of work using a flower reference, but quickly pivoted to using a series of images I captured on a particular day at the old age home where my gran currently lives. Earlier this year, I helped my parents move the last of her things from her old room, as she was being moved into high intensive care (a bed in a shared ward). I noticed a lot of flowers around the home and took photos of them.
Initially painting large, contextual interiors, I slowly began to emphasise the flowers and remove the surroundings in which they were placed – the windows, the tables, the chairs. The flowers became increasingly more emotive. Evocative rather of a moment than a direct interpretation of a particular vase of flowers within a particular context. Almost disappearing, the flowers become a carrier of my gestural mark-making. In a way the flowers, verging on abstraction, become a vessel of contained chaos. An acknowledgement that painting walks the line between intention and chance, in the same way that life is unpredictable. We rely on routine to give us a sense of control, yet the only constant is change.
The paintings also act as a reflection on time passed, on moments I’ve shared with people I love. The flowers stand in as a symbol of these histories, and the things we cannot say. Expressing how we feel, they are celebration and condolence. They are the passing of time and our tenuous connection to it. Tomorrow is the same picture painted over and over and over again.
Opening reception: Wednesday 12th June - 6pm
