JEANNE HOFFMAN
JEANNE HOFFMAN, A Long Wind, Carrying Bird Calls
Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 60 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s process begins with collage and continues through painting; fragments collected and recollected through a series of poetic responses and gestures. At times, references are recognisable; at others, illegible, pre-verbal marks and traces speak of the untamed, of peripheral presences, fugitive fragments hovering in the corner of the eye, burgeoning suggestions on the tip of the tongue. These fragments of experience and sensation make impressions on the unconscious mind and continue materialising on the canvas.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, A Vibration of Everyday Things
acrylic on cotton, 100 x 80 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far-flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels
in the spaces between things.
Paintings, drawings and ceramic objects function as dwelling
points – ‘temporary shelters for thoughts’ – as she explores the emotional and socio-cultural
dimensions of place. Hoffman says: ‘There is a direct correlation between travelling across a
landscape and the path of a graphic mark that transforms a blank page into an imaginary
space.’ ‘Drawing’ translates then not only to three-dimensional artistic mediums and physical
space, but also to a larger ‘stage’: Referential forms are assembled in relation with one
another, creating movement, dialogue and meaning on the fringes of delineation.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, But You Will End Up Exactly Where You Could Not Have Imagined
Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 60 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
In Hoffman’s work, fragments of multiple perspectives and memories lend themselves to a collage of many viewpoints, captured, for a moment, by the limits of the canvas and the artist’s particular choices. These material borrowings from disparate realities spill over into one another’s territory, instigating conversations. From one territory moves the unmitigated, primordial, ineffable; from another, the mediated, rationalised, observed – each drawn towards the other in this fertile space of painting.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Good Questions Return II
Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 80 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s process begins with collage and continues through painting; fragments collected and recollected through a series of poetic responses and gestures. At times, references are recognisable; at others, illegible, pre-verbal marks and traces speak of the untamed, of peripheral presences, fugitive fragments hovering in the corner of the eye, burgeoning suggestions on the tip of the tongue. These fragments of experience and sensation make impressions on the unconscious mind and continue materialising on the canvas.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, In Which Enchantment is Practiced
Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 60 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s paintings and exhibitions are, thus, intended as devices for contemplation – what Roland Barthes described as ‘stages’ upon which thoughts roam freely, that permit both artist and viewer to enter into a poetic landscape to engage with what words cannot say, being transformed by the gestures at play, where room is made for recognition, surprise and even refuge.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Now a Landscape, Now a Room
Acrylic on canvas, 120 x 100 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
The borrowing of multiple perspectives at once, where distance cohabits with immediacy, is inherent in the very process of artmaking. Meaning is made in the movement between up-close, personal preoccupation and a stepping back, offering a wider angle, but it is movement that simultaneously cloaks and clarifies. Resisting traditional categorisation of abstraction versus figuration, meaning is intimated in the liminal tension, at the moment just before things become certain.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Outside Coming In
acrylic on cotton, 100 x 80 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far-flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things. Paintings, drawings and ceramic objects function as dwelling points – ‘temporary shelters for thoughts’ – as she explores the emotional and socio-cultural dimensions of place. Hoffman says: ‘There is a direct correlation between travelling across a landscape and the path of a graphic mark that transforms a blank page into an imaginary space.’ ‘Drawing’ translates then not only to three-dimensional artistic mediums and physical space, but also to a larger ‘stage’: Referential forms are assembled in relation with one another, creating movement, dialogue and meaning on the fringes of delineation.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Standing Against the Sky
Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 50 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
The back and forth continues in the act of exhibiting – of reframing – how and where space opens: between individual pieces; between walls; between artist and viewer; between private and public. Individual and communal spaces become charged with relational meaning as yet unarticulated.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, The Sea Rushes Home
Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 100 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
The back and forth continues in the act of exhibiting – of reframing – how and where space opens: between individual pieces; between walls; between artist and viewer; between private and public. Individual and communal spaces become charged with relational meaning as yet unarticulated.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Think Like a Forest
Acrylic on canvas, 120 x 100 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s process begins with collage and continues through painting; fragments collected and recollected through a series of poetic responses and gestures. At times, references are recognisable; at others, illegible, pre-verbal marks and traces speak of the untamed, of peripheral presences, fugitive fragments hovering in the corner of the eye, burgeoning suggestions on the tip of the tongue. These fragments of experience and sensation make impressions on the unconscious mind and continue materialising on the canvas.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Think Like a Mountain
Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 80 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s paintings and exhibitions are, thus, intended as devices for contemplation – what Roland Barthes described as ‘stages’ upon which thoughts roam freely, that permit both artist and viewer to enter into a poetic landscape to engage with what words cannot say, being transformed by the gestures at play, where room is made for recognition, surprise and even refuge.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, To Wander and be Distracted
Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 80 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s paintings and exhibitions are, thus, intended as devices for contemplation – what Roland Barthes described as ‘stages’ upon which thoughts roam freely, that permit both artist and viewer to enter into a poetic landscape to engage with what words cannot say, being transformed by the gestures at play, where room is made for recognition, surprise and even refuge.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Unravelling Certainties
Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 100 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s process begins with collage and continues through painting; fragments collected and recollected through a series of poetic responses and gestures. At times, references are recognisable; at others, illegible, pre-verbal marks and traces speak of the untamed, of peripheral presences, fugitive fragments hovering in the corner of the eye, burgeoning suggestions on the tip of the tongue. These fragments of experience and sensation make impressions on the unconscious mind and continue materialising on the canvas.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Vast Misunderstood Country
Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 120 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
Hoffman’s process begins with collage and continues through painting; fragments collected and recollected through a series of poetic responses and gestures. At times, references are recognisable; at others, illegible, pre-verbal marks and traces speak of the untamed, of peripheral presences, fugitive fragments hovering in the corner of the eye, burgeoning suggestions on the tip of the tongue. These fragments of experience and sensation make impressions on the unconscious mind and continue materialising on the canvas.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, When at Last we Drift Loose II
Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 120 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
In Hoffman’s work, fragments of multiple perspectives and memories lend themselves to a collage of many viewpoints, captured, for a moment, by the limits of the canvas and the artist’s particular choices. These material borrowings from disparate realities spill over into one another’s territory, instigating conversations. From one territory moves the unmitigated, primordial, ineffable; from another, the mediated, rationalised, observed – each drawn towards the other in this fertile space of painting.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Whispered Sun
Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 50 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
In Hoffman’s work, fragments of multiple perspectives and memories lend themselves to a collage of many viewpoints, captured, for a moment, by the limits of the canvas and the artist’s particular choices. These material borrowings from disparate realities spill over into one another’s territory, instigating conversations. From one territory moves the unmitigated, primordial, ineffable; from another, the mediated, rationalised, observed – each drawn towards the other in this fertile space of painting.
JEANNE HOFFMAN, Wonderfully, You Don't Even See it Until it is Right Underfoot
Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 50 cm
Working across diverse mediums and far flung geographies, artist Jeanne Hoffman revels in the spaces between things.
The borrowing of multiple perspectives at once, where distance cohabits with immediacy, is inherent in the very process of artmaking. Meaning is made in the movement between up-close, personal preoccupation and a stepping back, offering a wider angle, but it is movement that simultaneously cloaks and clarifies. Resisting traditional categorisation of abstraction versus figuration, meaning is intimated in the liminal tension, at the moment just before things become certain.
Specialists in contemporary art from South Africa. Established in 1913. South African artists are part of the global conversation. We seek to make their voices heard.