Flood: Breede River Valley (2025)

 Flood: Breede River Valley

Hartebees River Clay, Burnt Plant Material and Chalk on Canvas

164x396cm

2025

 

This work commissioned for the Spier Hotel reception, is one of the largest paintings I have ever undertaken and represents the pinnacle of a series I have been developing over the last two years, focusing on flooding across the world. 

 

My research into this subject began in March 2023, after Cyclone Freddy devastated Malawi. Since then, I have been tracking global flooding events and examining the ways in which human interventions in natural systems contribute to these disasters.

My connection to this subject is also deeply personal. For over a decade, I have worked with clay sourced from the Hartebees River, a tributary of the Breede River.

This river holds deep familial significance, as it once flowed through land belonging to my maternal lineage. The brilliant yellow clay from this river has become a signature material in my work, connecting three generations of Afrikaner women—my grandmother, my mother, and myself. The name of my grandmother’s former smallholding, Raaswater (“raging waters”), once reflected the power of this river, but today, the river is silent and has been reduced to a trickle due to irrigation withdrawals, river channelling, and changes in rainfall patterns.

 

Many factors contribute to flooding worldwide. One key factor is the intensification of rainfall due to climate change—heavier downpours over shorter periods—falling on drier land that is unable to absorb water quickly. Additionally, human interventions such as river channelization and the destruction of wetlands, which naturally absorb excess water, have worsened flooding. Poor dam maintenance, extreme weather events, and encroachment of farmland into flood-prone areas also exacerbate flood damage.

 

The flood of 2024, which affected the Breede River Valley, serves as a stark example of these issues. Speaking with local farmers who suffered crop and infrastructure losses has been a heart-rending experience for me. 

While the destruction caused by these global floods are unquestionable, there is also an undeniable beauty in the way water reshapes landscapes; an awe inspiring and terrible beauty reminding us of water’s immense power and how we as human beings need to consider the natural laws governing climate, riparian routes, water management and wetlands. 

 

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This painting is created using yellow clay collected from the Hartebees River, on Raaswater. Working in this clay and recognising that I am working with a natural material helps with contemplating the age of this landscape. Soil or clay is after all decomposed organic matter of living things and minerals that slowly gather together over hundreds of thousands of years.

Connection to this deep time of a place helps me to connect to its history on many levels. The fact that my grandmother lived on this farm and that my mother grew up here is a splinter of a moment in a very long history to this land. And thus, I see this personal history simply as a starting point of relatedness. 

The clay is a very difficult medium to work with since it is a natural substance and has a strong character of its own and behaves differently on any given day, depending on the weather, the amount of water I add to it and of course my own mood. Therefore, my interaction with this specific clay has been a very long process of symbiotic experimentation and creation to get to the place where I am now. 

In addition to clay, I incorporate burnt plant material from Raaswater, referencing the fynbos ecosystem of this area, which regenerates through fire. I see it as a hopeful material to work with as it links with the myth of the Phoenix that rises again from the ashes to be born again. Chalk, another key material in this work, adds a further layer of meaning. Formed from ancient microscopic marine organisms, chalk speaks to water’s enduring presence in shaping landscapes over deep time.

This painting is an expression of my process with the Earth, with a specific place on the Earth that I have built a relationship to. What is significant about the process is that as I have spent time with this place, reading about it, researching it, meeting its people and working with its clay. The place has become a part of me and I have become a part of it. Rather than saying that this place belongs to me, I feel that I belong to this place.  And thus, anything that happens to this place affects me and changes me too.

I do not intend to convey a singular message with this painting. Rather, I hope it invites viewers to reflect on their relationship with the natural world and to recognise that the environmental changes we are witnessing are symptoms of deeper imbalances in how we interact with natural systems.

It is especially poignant that this seminal work from my practice finds a home at Spier whose dedication to land extends to restoring its natural balance through indigenous restoration, water and waste recycling.