A limited edition lithograph of Nelson Mandela as a young man by one of South Africa’s most internationally renowned living artists will be auctioned in Cape Town at the Stephan Welz & Co. Decorative and Fine Arts Auction, 19 and 20 February.
Portrait of A Young Nelson Mandela is one in a series of 250 lithographs by Cape Town-born artist, who has resided in Amsterdam since 1976. With the sale of her painting The Teacher for $3.34 million in 2005, Dumas established a new record for a living female artist and was considered the world’s most expensive female artist at the time. In 1995, she represented the Netherlands in the Venice Bienniale and has had major exhibitions in cities across the world.
Dumas works mostly in oil and ink on paper and is best known for portraits, generally derived from photographs of her subjects. Her dark portrait of singer Amy Winehouse, which was painted after Winehouse’s death, was recently acquired by the National Portrait Gallery in London.
In 2010, Dumas was awarded an honorary doctorate from Rhodes University in Grahamstown, and in 2012, her entire body of work was awarded the the Johannes Vermeer Award, the Dutch State Prize for the Arts.
The portrait of Nelson Mandela up for sale at the Stephan Welz & Co. auction is signed by Dumas, and has been estimated at R50 000 to R60 000.
Another South African luminary artistically captured is singer Miriam Makeba, the subject in the photograph by Jürgen Schadeberg valued at R22 000 to R25 000, which is also up for sale. The photograph is similar to a 1955 cover of Drum magazine, and shows the integrity inherent in Schaedeberg’s work as a photographer, who took a step beyond racial boundaries in order to capture a significant work of art in the making.
Schadeberg, who was one of the legendary Drum chief photographers, photographed many key historic events like the Defiance Campaign of 1952 and the Sharpeville Funeral of 1960, he was also one of the few white photographers who captured daily life in the black community, helping to bring the vibrancy of township life to unfamiliar eyes.
In 2012, a Schadeberg photograph of Nelson Mandela sold for R72 500 at a Stephan Welz & Co. Auction in Johannesburg, at double its estimated value.
The Decorative and Fine Arts Auction at Stephan Welz & Co. will be held on Tuesday, 19 and Wednesday, 20 February, 2013 at The Great Cellar, Alphen Estate, Alphen Drive, Constantia. Pre-auction viewing open to the public at no charge, Friday, 15 February to Sunday, 17 February, 10h00 until 17h00 daily.
For more information, contact 021-794-6461 or e-mail <mailto:ct@stephanwelzandco.co.za> ct@stephanwelzandco.co.za. The auction catalogue can be viewed at <http://www.stephanwelzandco.co.za>
Story and Image Source: SA Creatives