Chris Slabber’s Endo Exhibition

WORDS Cheri Morris

Chris Slabber presents his latest works at an exhibition entitled Endo: An Exploration of the Skeleton at Ellis House in New Doornfontein, Johannesburg.

Critically acclaimed photo manipulator and mixed media illustrations guru Chris Slabber hails from the heart of the Klein Karoo and is a multi-award winning artist. His latest exhibition, curated by Dead Bunny Society, is an effort to discard the notion that the skeleton represents only the temporary nature of our life cycle, the unknown and/or evil. His elaborate installations intend rather to instil the idea in viewers that the skeleton is an object of physical beauty and deeper contemplation.

The subject matter of the exhibition is made up of various kinds of observations including immediate, imaginative, psychological and cross-cultural ancestral connections. Mediums used include ink illustration, mixed-media collage and photo manipulation consisting of both original pieces and prints. The exhibition is divided into four different explorations:

Hybrids: the documentation of the skeletons of ancient Greek and Egyptian mythological creatures.
Lifelines: images rendered using straight lines created by three different pen nibs that upon closer inspection appear to be just lines and upon further viewing resemble an identifiable skeleton.
Rorschach: custom Rorschach inkblot tests are blended with a complementing photograph of a skull, digitally manipulated and printed on aluminium sheets.
Ancestral: a smaller, narrative-based installation that explores the earliest human civilisations through the fusion of photographs of modern humans and skulls from the Cro-Magnon era.

The exhibition opens on Saturday 11 February 2017 at 12pm and runs until 5 March 2017.