Bloodlines… Adele van Heerden

I get so many art submissions, I get a little behind on posting them. Now I feel kind of dumb, because when I opened an email from South African artist Adele van Heerden, and followed the link to her work, I was stoked to discover the beauty and depth of her work, and then dismayed to realize that I had failed to put the post up in time for her show last month, “Return to Nature.” But better late than never to showcase her delicate, cold, yet intimate portraits of still humans and pensive animals. Her human portraits have an element of corpse about them – not necessarily because of their expressions, more because of the way she shades them with a bruising texture. She draws animals with a sensitivity that belies her dark imagination, but when you look closely at the details you see the bones, the third eye, the crushing jaws. One of her exhibitions that I found the most intriguing is her “Bloedlyne,” or “Bloodlines” piece, where she took a ballpoint pen and a vial of her own blood and drew the path of her Voortrekkers ancestors on the walls of a gallery. The result was a map of both her DNA and their journey through South Africa, and to me, shows a dedication to her craft that can only be paid in blood. Apparently she has another upcoming exhibition in Cape Town, check her Facebook page for more details. After the jump, check out more of her work…