Nel Erasmus Collection

 

Nel (Petronella Margaretha) Erasmus was born in 1928 in Bethal. She completed her BA in Fine Arts in the year 1949. In 1951 she taught art at the Art School of Witwatersrand Technical College and in 1952 she taught at the Johannesburg High School for Girls. Between the years 1953-1955 she moved abroad to further her studies. She took private lessons with a Czech -German artist Gina Berndtson who concentrated mainly on the understanding of colour (US Museum, 2000:16). While in England, she taught art for a couple of months and went on to study further in Paris at the Sorbonne, Ecole des Beaux Arts and Academie Ranson. She held her first important exhibition with two other painters at the Galerie Bogroff in Paris. In 1966 she was appointed Director of the Johannesburg Art Museum. Since her retirement in 1977 she focused more on her career as an artist. She is deemed as one of the most important post-war painters with a career that spanned more than 60 years (Stellenbosch Modern and Contemporary Art Museum, 2009). References: Stellenbosch Modern and Contemporary Art Museum. 2009. Nel Erasmus: Portraits 1949-2009 (Exhibition Catalogue). SMAC publishing: Stellenbosch; Stellenbosch Modern and Contemporary Art Museum. 2011. Nel Erasmus (Exhibition Catalogue). SMAC Publishing: Stellenbosch; University of Stellenbosch Museum. 2000. Nel Erasmus. (Exhibition Catalogue). University of Stellenbosch Museum: Stellenbosch; Berman, Esme. 1983. Art and Artists of South Africa: New Enlarged Edition. AA Balkema: Cape Town.

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