Joshua Pearse grew up in Makhanda (formerly Grahamstown) and obtained a BA degree in Fine Arts from the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town in 2018.

His graduate project, titled The Hunter and His Dog, will be on show at WORLDART from 7 – 17 February. This consists of a video installation, a sculpture and a large drawing.

The exhibition explores existence and its meaning, using the tripartite theology of being as a starting point. A sculpture completed in 1838 by the Welsh artist John Gibson, today freely available for 3-D printing to anybody who wants to, provides the physical reference.

The three exhibited artworks on show consist of a video symbolic of the spirit, a drawing symbolic of the soul and a sculpture symbolic of the body.

In the video piece the sculpture of the hunter and his dog is resting on a flat reflective plane. This plane begins to deform, showing gentle ripples at first but progressing to waves as if it were an ocean, ultimately enveloping the sculpture. This alludes to a baptism; immersion of self or a form of death.

The drawing is a hand drawn copy of an image rendered off the scan of the sculpture using 3d software, referring to the soul and its emotional connection to creativity.

The sculpture features as a fractured and hollowed foot, in reference to the Colossus of Constantine – the giant Roman sculpture now only existing as separate body pieces.

A more in depth conversation with the artist about this body of work is available at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbuyAvtYhcVVOwFDAmmk55g

For more information, contact his gallerist Charl Bezuidenhout at charl@worldart.co.za or visit www.worldart.co.za.