George Milwa Mnyalaza Pemba
(1912 – 2001)
“I aim to paint my people as I see them. I also like to depict beautiful and dignified mountains, rivers and landscapes of South Africa.” George Pemba.
One of South Africa’s pioneer black painters, George Milwa Mnyaluza Pemba, was born in Hill’s Kraal in Korsten, Port Elizabeth on the 2 April 1912, the second youngest of six children to parents Titus and Rebecca. His father was a foreman at a shoe factory and an elder of their Presbyterian church, whilst his mother’s side of the family were craftsmen, dressmakers and tailors. As a child Pemba’s father encouraged him to draw and to paint, which he did in their family home, creating portraits from his father’s photographs. He continued to concentrate on portraits for his career and looked closely at depicting the rural and urban genre, especially that of the Eastern Cape where he spent most of his life.
Pemba was trained as a teacher, but worked for the Lovedale Printing Press and as a clerk in Port Elizabeth. To make a better income he then worked as a grocer from the 1950s to the late 1970s, all the while continuing with his artwork. As with the majority of rural schools, art and drawing was never taught as a subject and was quickly dismissed by teachers and the board of education during this period. Pemba later briefly attended the University at Fort Hare and the University of Rhodes, where he developed his skills in watercolour, although he remained mainly self-taught in the other mediums he used. Pemba’s exposure to oil paintings was from looking at mainly European modernist works from his teachers’ books, which he began to collect for himself. The artists who he admired most were French Impressionists, including Renoir, Monet, Toulouse Lautrec, Degas and Gauguin. He found himself 50 years after these artists applying, sometimes erratically, the techniques and approaches that they had used, but in a different cultural context entirely.
Pemba’s depictions of life scenes expose his great interest in local life and local people and a great sense of narrative is present within these works. Yet, to look at this genre as a simple ‘record’ of township life does not allow for the complicated constructions of a historical context to be formed. Pemba’s varied borrowing and knowledge of subject matter, including his portraits, forms a personal and ambiguous presentation of experiments that he undertook, which results in a style that is difficult to categorise.
George Pemba’s work illustrates a universal quality and timelessness that has secured his prominence within South African historical art. The deliberation of composition and use of colour in his works create a richness and intensity that is a reflection of the artist himself. Through the recognition he has received in the last decade, Pemba is considered one of South Africa’s most prominent artists and places him in the foreground of South African art.
1912
Born Korsten, Port Elizabeth, Cape Province (now Eastern Cape), South Africa
1924
Won a Grey Scholarship to Peterson School, took strong interest in the art books in theschool library
1928
Entered and won and art completion at a local agricultural show
Late 1930s
His works were accepted for an exhibition of “Negro and Bantu Art’ in Port Elizabeth, following this, Pemba exhibited regularly until shortly before his death
1948
Pemba turned professional in the late 1940s with his first solo exhibition in East London
1979
Awarded an honorary Masters’ Degree from the University of Fort Hare for his contribution to South African art.
2001
Died in Port Elizabet
1931 – 1935
Enrolled at the Lovedale Teacher’s Training College
1931
Watercolour classes under Ethel Smyth for two weeks at the University of Fort Hare
1937
A short course at Rhodes University Fine Arts Department under Professor Austin Wintermoore
1947
Gained a scholarship from the Fort Hare African Trust
1952
Two-week period of study under Maurice van Essche in Cape Town
1928
Group Exhibition, Feathermarket Hall, Port Elizabeth
1945
Annual Exhibition, Eastern Province Society of Arts and Crafts, Port Elizabeth
1965
Participated in the Eastern Province Arts Association
1975
First Solo exhibition, Little Gallery, Port Elizabeth
1979
Participated in the Contemporary African Art Exhibition which toured South Africa
1986
Participated in ‘Historical Perspectives of Black Art in South Africa’, Alliance Française, Pretoria
1988
The Neglected Tradition,Johannesburg Art Gallery
1989
Exhibition, Monument Gallery, Grahamstown
1991
Solo Exhibition, Everard Read Gallery, Johannesburg
1992
Solo Exhibition, Everard Read Gallery, Johannesburg
1993
Watercolour Exhibition, Highbury Gallery, Port Elizabeth
1996
Retrospective Exhibition, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town; Johannesburg Art Gallery; Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum, Port Elizabeth
Public Collections – International
- The World Bank Collection, Washington,DC
Galleries & Museums
- IzikoSANational Gallery, Cape Town
- Sanlam Art Gallery, Bellville
- De Beers Centenary Art Gallery
- Johannesburg Art Gallery
- Tatham Art Gallery, Pietermaritzburg
- Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum, Port Elizabeth
Universities
- Cory Library for Historical Research, Rhodes University, Grahamstown
- University of Fort Hare
- Killie Campbell Collections, University of Natal, Durban
Private Collections
- United States of America
- South Africa
1924
Grey Scholarship to Paterson Secondary School, Port Elizabeth
1937
First prize at May Esther Bedford Art Competition, Fort Hare
1979
Awarded an honorary Masters’ Degree from the University of Fort Hare for his contribution to South African art.
1998
Honorary Doctorate, University of Port Elizabeth
2004
The South African Government bestowed upon the late George Pemba the Order of Ikhamanga in Gold for his pioneering and exceptional contribution to the development of the art of painting and literature
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