This was the thought process that led to Christina Bryer and Lucas Bambo being commissioned to produce the works given to recipients of the 2011 Stellenbosch University (SU) Vice-Chancellor’s Awards as a token of the institution’s appreciation.
Donors in the gold category (donations exceeding R5 million) each received a Bryer porcelain mandala, and recipients of the Vice-Chancellor’s Award (donations of over R1 million) got a Bambo linocut print.
Bryer’s unique approach to porcelain has earned her great respect in the art world. She initially studied Jewellery Design – first at SU, and later in Germany under the famous Prof Reinhold Reiling.
In 1974 she returned to teach Jewellery Techniques at SU. In 1977 she completed a postgraduate qualification in the UK under renowned porcelain artist Caroline Whyman.
Bryer constructs every piece individually based on a design system inspired by aperiodic tiling. She utilises natural minerals and oxides, and limits the use of glazes to a minimum to retain a pure, vitrified porcelain finish.
Bambo is a master printmaker, using linocut as his medium. He hails from rural KwaNdebele northeast of Pretoria, where he spent his afternoons painting and sketching. He later studied at the famed Fuba (Federated Union of Black Arts) Academy in Newtown, Johannesburg.
He received a merit award in the Atelier Art Competition, won the Absa Bank Millennium National Art competition in 1999, and was a finalist for the Brett Kebble Art Prize in 2003. He has exhibited in South Africa, Norway, the US, France, Hungary, the UK and Mexico.
After making the prints for the Vice-Chancellor’s Awards, Bambo destroyed the original linocut to ensure that the recipients’ gifts would remain unique.