Still Life Flowers 1979

Gregoire Boonzaier made this linocut, "Still Life Flowers," sometime during his career as a painter in South Africa. The image offers the bright optimism of the still life genre, but its starkness suggests that it is more than just a decorative object. Boonzaier came from a line of artists and writers associated with the Afrikaaner cultural movement. Many of his artworks depict the lives of working-class people and people of color in Cape Town. With its limited color palette, this print seems to reference the Black Sash movement against apartheid. The white calla lilies, native to South Africa, might be stand-ins for the activists who protested injustice in the streets. To understand this image better, we need to investigate Boonzaier's other works, and to know more about the cultural politics of South Africa as it struggled with and eventually overcame its system of racial oppression. The meaning of art lies in how it engages with social context.