https://ir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/177 2026-05-09T04:04:51Z 2026-05-09T04:04:51Z Dreyer, Elfriede https://ir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/32444 2026-05-08T06:48:58Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Bitterbessie Dagbreek Dreyer, Elfriede The Bitterbessie Dagbreek series of six works plus an artist book were commissioned by academic curator Professor Gwenneth Miller for the national Aardklop festival of 2025. I was then invited to exhibit the works at the Gallery at Glen Carlou in the Western Cape for subsequent exhibition. The series follows on my ongoing exploration of the intermedial, semantic and hermeneutic relationships between work, image and sound. In this series there is no sound but the imagery evokes the sound of crackling fire. The works were inspired by Ingrid Jonker’s poems Bitterbessie Dagbreek and Op die Voetpad. The works extend my ongoing exploration of the shifting relationship between word and image, where meaning is never fixed but continually re-formed. The works developed from an artist’s book created as a visual response to these poems, which speak of loss and the solitary path each person takes in processing grief. I experienced the burning of my house, and Jonker’s imagery of the pine forest (in front of our house), the road (from the lake to our home), and dawn resonated deeply with my own lived experience. When morning breaks in red and orange after a traumatic event, the full impact of what has occurred becomes unavoidable. Existential metaphors emerge throughout the series: the road as the walk of life; daybreak as the searing moment after disaster; landscape as event; and the orange sky as an unfolding process of reckoning and becoming.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Dreyer, Elfriede https://ir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/32443 2026-05-08T06:30:13Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Composite Dreyer, Elfriede The Composite project (2025) comprises fourteen new artworks presented across three group exhibitions and a solo exhibition held from 20 September to 20 October 2025 at The Viewing Room Gallery in Pretoria. The group exhibitions formed part of Wild at White River Gallery, Mpumalanga (10 May – 1 June 2025); Wild at Attic Atelier, George, Western Cape (16 April – 17 May 2025), as well as the international ONAVU exhibition at Galerie Latuvu, Bages, France (5 July – 6 September 2025). All presentations included artist walkabouts. The works remain permanently accessible at: https://www.elfriededreyer.com/composite. The works engage with the shifting dynamics of the natural world, where floods, fires, and erratic weather patterns have become a new evolutionary constant. Seasonal rhythms are increasingly destabilised: spring arrives earlier, midsummer is disrupted by cold fronts, and droughts give way to sudden flooding. Situated within the discourse of the Anthropocene, my intermedial practice explores the entangled consequences of human activity on ecological and geological systems. Land is approached not only as a site of environmental crisis but as a palimpsest, a kind of layered repository of memory, transformation, and deep time. Within this framework, archetypal dualities of male and female are invoked as foundational principles in nature: the maternal is associated with soil, nurture, and regeneration; the paternal with stone, structure, and endurance. Rock functions as an archive, inscribed with traces of geological formation and anthropogenic disruption. Landscape is conceived as a sentient entity, its language apprehended through sight, sound, and spatial awareness. The intersection of sound and image produces a composite palimpsest of sensory impressions. In the context of the Anthropocene, this translation acquires urgency in relation to deafness, where sign language operates as both method and metaphor—a reflection of humanity’s inability, or refusal, to heed environmental warnings. Deafness and sign language recur as formal and conceptual devices, foregrounding a broader reluctance to engage with environmental crisis. Through this lens, the work opens territories of meaning between body, environment, and time. The Composite series engages the four elements—fire, earth, air, and water—to address cycles of evolution, destruction, and renewal. More broadly, my practice investigates worldmaking—natural, virtual, and personal—and the ways in which such worlds are constructed and inhabited as layered repositories of history, memory, and experience. These concerns often unfold through tensions between utopian imaginaries and their counterpoints: dystopia and heterotopia.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Visser, Beatrice https://ir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/32279 2026-03-29T08:33:25Z 2024-09-01T00:00:00Z

The articulation of trauma in pet loss through ceramic art: an ontological investigation Visser, Beatrice This study investigates the ways in which ceramic art expresses the trauma of pet loss. An ontological investigation, it focuses on the strong attachment bonds I have shared with my pets. The project aims to advance fresh perspectives on the themes of grief, trauma and loss as these relate to pet-owner relationships, while conceptually relevant theories underpin my solo art exhibition, Per(pet)ual Memorium 1 (2024). The artworks explore traumatic recollections after the deaths of beloved companion animals. An analysis of relevant literature, including a comparative theoretical study, supports the conclusions drawn through the art praxis of Per(pet)ual Memorium. My reflective approach to art-making enables theory to guide the creative process where fresh insights emerge from practical developments and facilitate the revision of initial impressions.; Hierdie studie stel ondersoek in na die maniere waarop keramiekkuns die trauma van die verlies aan ’n troeteldier uitdruk. Hierdie ontologiese ondersoek fokus op die sterk hegtheidsband wat ek met my troeteldiere gedeel het. Die projek is daarop gemik om nuwe perspektiewe op die temas van smart, trauma en verlies te werp soos dit met troeteldier-eienaarverhoudings verband hou, onderwyl konseptueel relevante teorieë die onderbou van my individuele kunsuitstalling: Per(pet)ual Memorium vorm. Die kunswerke verken traumatiese herinneringe na die dood van geliefde dieremaats. ’n Analise van relevante literatuur, insluitend ’n vergelykende teoretiese studie ondersteun die gevolgtrekkings waartoe daar gekom is deur die kunspraktyk in Per(pet)ual Memorium. My reflektiewe benadering tot kunsskepping maak dit vir die teorie moontlik om rigting te gee aan die kreatiewe proses waar nuwe insigte uit praktiese ontwikkelings voortspruit en die hersiening van aanvanklike indrukke fasiliteer. Text in English with summaries in Afrikaans and Zulu

2024-09-01T00:00:00Z Diko, Andisiwe https://ir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/32009 2025-01-15T10:53:46Z 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z

How to structure an essay Diko, Andisiwe The Open Educational Resource (OER) was created to support undergraduate students in Art History who struggle with academic writing. It is designed to teach them the basics of academic writing and what is expected when writing an essay. Students who register for Art History modules at UNISA come from various disciplines, such as Education, Communication Science, and Language Studies. The objective of the OER is to teach students writing principles that they can apply in Art History and other disciplines that use essay assessments. The OER focuses on how essays are structured, explaining what an introduction, body, and conclusion is with provided examples. This simplifies the process for students from different academic backgrounds.

2024-01-01T00:00:00Z