Nel Erasmus

Nel Erasmus (born 1928 in Bethal, Transvaal Province, South Africa) is a South African artist.

Erasmus once stated, “I am happiest when heart and head seem to walk a tightrope on the canvas – where feeling and thought seem to be in tension. For me these two sometimes manage to contain me and my shadow, my heart and my head…”.

Erasmus studied at the Académie Ranson, Ecole des Beaux Arts and the Sorbonne in Paris in 1953 and exhibited her works for the first time in Paris in 1955. Her first solo exhibition was in South Africa in 1957 and she is one of the earliest abstract artists of South Africa. Erasmus has produced thirty solo exhibitions, taken part in more than seventy group exhibitions and her writing has been widely published. Although Erasmus was never a ‘popular’ painter, her work received much critical acclaim and she was the only South African artist to be included in Michel Seuphor’s 1964 survey of abstraction, Abstract Painting: 50 Years of Accomplishment.

Three other South Africans who spent time with Erasmus in Paris in the early 1950s and who appeared to have been inspired by the intuitive processes of post-war abstract painting in Paris were Christo Coetzee, Paul du Toit, and Eric Loubser.

Nel Erasmus was an early proponent of Abstract Art in South Africa – both as a practice and a principle. Erasmus also influenced the South African art scene as director of the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG) (1966–1977).

The New Church Museum curator Marilyn Martin, who curated the Museum's Thinking, Feeling, Head, Heart exhibition, describes Erasmus' abstract content through two of her works, Space Dance II and Whirlwind, which are both characterised by brightly coloured forms in flux.Martin says, “The time bound object dissolves and reshapes itself into symbols, images and signs, which it actually and secretly contains within itself. These signs can point more directly towards the essence of a thing, its energy; its relatedness to things other than itself."

• 1950 University of the Witwatersrand, BA Fine Arts (under Joyce Leonard and Heather Martienssen, with Christo Coetzee, Gordon Vorster, Cecil Skotnes, and Larry Scully)
• 1952 National Arts Teacher’s Certificate, Wits Technikon
• 1952 Private study under Gina Berndtson
• Henry Focillon’s La vie des Formes - Nel Erasmus calls this book the “bible” for her work.
• Anton Hendriks, Director of the Johannesburg Art Gallery when Erasmus started working there, gave her an appreciation of museum discipline and intellectual honesty through his historical and philosophical interests.
• 1953–1955 Sorbonne, Ecole des Beaux Arts and Académie Ranson, Paris (under Gustave Singier, Selim Turan, and Marcel Fiorini)

Painting periods

• 1960s – formalist/post-cubist abstract period
• Early 1970s – emotionally-revealing and expressive
• Late 1970s – quiet colour fields fleeting energies give way to slow pushes and pulls
• 1980s – calligraphy and objects in flux
• 1990s – body as vessel, seed and germination
• 2000s – portraiture, polarity of heart and mind
• 2010s – flight
• Currently – patterns of sound

Director of the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG) 1966–1977

Nel Erasmus worked at the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG) from 1957 as Professional Officer until her retirement as Director in 1977. She has contributed to the acquisition of artworks to public and corporate (especially Sanlam and Sasol) collections in South Africa, in particular the international modern and contemporary collection at the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG).

Erasmus’ notorious acquisition in 1973, the year Picasso died, of Pablo Picasso’s Tête d’Arlequin (1971) was made possible by funding from The Friends of the Museum organization. The acquisition of this painting of a clown met with resistance from conservative, censored, isolated, apartheid South Africa, “No normal person would like this painting”, and provoked Erasmus to write a paper about why the acquisition was made.

Nel Erasmus writes in response to the response of visitors to Picasso’s Tête d’Arlequin, that art is not there to please or depict, it is there to reveal. Erasmus says that because Picasso had such an impact on art in our times, museums should have an example of his work in their permanent collections. With this acquisition JAG now had an example of Picasso’s mature post-cubist work. Erasmus asks the public not to refer to the painting as that of a clown, but as a harlequin and so give him the respect he is due.

Erasmus explained that it was policy of other art museums in South Africa to make collections of South African art and JAG did have a policy to focus on international art. During her tenure she also grew the South African collection extensively. By 1975 an exhibition of 40 artists was held of JAG's holdings.

Nel Erasmus is in her 80s and still paints daily. The most recent exhibitions she has participated in were solo exhibitions in 2009 in the Dawid Ras Art Gallery (Johannesburg) and in 2015 in the Dawid Ras Gallery (Cape Town), and since then various group exhibitions.

• 1991 Helgaard Steyn Award for Best South African Painting for Jazz Baby/Spent Autumn (1991)

• 1955 Galerie Bogroff, Paris
• 1955 10th Salon des Réalités Nouvelles in the Musée d'Art Modern, Paris
• 1957 Henri Lidchi Art Gallery, Johannesburg (first solo exhibition)
• 1957 Galerie Creuze and Musée d'Art Modern, Paris
• 1965 Second Biennale de Paris, Paris and year appointed at Johannesburg Art Gallery as Professional Officer)
• 1965 São Paulo Biennale, São Paulo
• 1982–1991 Cassirer Fine Art Gallery, Johannesburg

• Anglo-American
• Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town – Sketch for the Great Cellist (1963), The Great Celllist (1963)
• Johannesburg Art Gallery, Johannesburg – Whirlpool in a Human Matrix (1974)
• Oliewenhuis Art Museum, Bloemfontein - Jazz Baby/Spent Autumn (1991)
• Pretoria Art Museum, Pretoria – Space Dance No. 5 (1984); Bold Swimmer (1986)
• Rand Merchant Bank
• Rembrandt Art Foundation – Lamps (1964)
• Sasol Collection
• Sanlam Art Collection – 6th Day of Creation (1995)
• Telkom
• University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch – Hands Off (1989)
• University of the Witwatersrand Art Museum, Johannesburg