Georgia Papageorge

Georgia Papageorge is a South African visual and installation artist involved in environmental activism and earth art. She was born in Simon's Town, Cape Province, on the 12th February 1941, and earned a bachelor's degree in fine arts from the University of South Africa in Pretoria (1979) and a higher diploma in graphic design from Pretoria Technikon (1981). Papageorge’s focus on art began after the passing of her two year old daughter due to cancer, this tragic loss continues to inspire her work.

The artist is well known for her large-scale environmental installations through which she explores the metaphorical relationship between geography and human experience. In her work, geography is not defined by topography alone; places and locations bear the marks of their histories and struggles, and the lived human experiences may help to tell apart one place from another. According to the artist, she reached the climax of her career with Africa Rifting: Lines of Fire, Namibia/Brazil 2001, a project that took place in the town of Torres in Southern Brazil on 11 September 2001. “This was 9/11, and 3 minutes and 24 seconds before the first plane struck a World Trade Tower I was pouring a huge fall of blood red cloth down the so-called Lava Towers of Torres in Southern Brazil, where I was creating a huge bannered cross and line installation” says the artist.

Much of Papageorge's earlier work makes commentary on the monstrosity of apartheid and the fragmented or rifted consciousness it created amongst South Africans. Furthermore, the political violence and upheavals of the 1980's in South Africa provided the conceptual themes and basis of her work. Her works such as Collaboration, Suspension and other epic works have been exhibited in the U.S. including the State Museum of North Dakota, which cares for an extensive body of her work, and published a full catalog covering ten years of her artistry, in 1995.

The artist also has three of her works; Suspension in Relation to the Last Supper III,Through the Barrier -1956 Treason Trial Frieze and Ladder, and Africa Rifting: Lines of Fire Namibia/Brazil in the custody of the Constitutional Court Art Collection.

Through curated facts and photographic evidence, Papageorge’s passionate, symbolic and emotionally charged work insists that we pay attention.