In their solo exhibition ‘stones embrace, a love spiral of erosion and renewal’ at Stevenson Gallery Johannesburg, Bronwyn Katz contemplates reciprocities of love between stones, soil, trees and water residues employed within the show. Expanding on their practice of using found materials to oscillate finding, learning and devising language; they use natural materials to converge the terrestrial and celestial through sculpture, installation and audio.

In !KhāIIaeb (Flowering season), found tree barks and stone are held together by iron ore. The shape of each bark determines where the stone is placed, resulting in each stone finding home in a grove. Upon close inspection it’s evident that the stones, although smaller in size, are also cradling the tree bark, imbuing an affectionate exchange between sources of life. Collectively, they hang suspended on the wall and read as imitations of constellations or moving lizards.

Amid them sit two Kalahari cacti Maaghout (Stomach wood) (i) faces Maaghout (Stomach wood) (ii) from across the exhibition space. They are harvested with stones gathered from the sea mountain in Cape Town, copper wire and mild steel firmly bind them into their new form. In thinking about the contrasting nature of stone, how its outward rigidity merges a malleability for carving, properties of restoration are displayed in Katz's choice to leave their forms uninterrupted and instead willing them into embrace.

Katz’s voice hovers above the exhibition and Soetdoring tree installation within it. In the audio installation, they share a childhood tale about their darling Soetes (Sweetness), a tree that wildly populates itself on land that has suffered damage, ushering in healing while bearing sweet yet forbidden fruit.

Hailing from Kimberley and working between Cape Town and Johannesburg, Katz’s approach to making is driven by storytelling and intuition. Conceptually, the artist's sculptures refer to the political context of their making, embodying subtle acts of resistance that draw attention to the social constructions and boundaries that continue to define our environments. Exhibiting internationally, recent solos include ‘Kaeen-de-haree, Lively sunshine’ at Andrew Kreps, New York (2023) and ‘Tus tsĩ ǀxurub, Rain and drought’ at MASSIMODECARLO in Paris (2023). In 2022 Katz was selected as a protégé for the Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative, set to work with El Anatsui over a period of two years. They were also shortlisted for the Future Generation Art Prize in 2021 and received the First National Bank Art Prize in 2019.

Mpumi Mayisa: Bronwyn, could you tell me about how you started seeing objects as forms that could be re-imagined, reconfigured and revitalised?

Bronwyn Katz: It's all intuitive and play. I suppose I began by being curious, I was collecting objects that have a place in the world already, living with them and being curious about what other forms they could take. In wondering what else pot scourers or bed springs could be, I engaged processes of reimagining them which made me look into their parts and what they were made out of. When I started deconstructing the beds I noticed that the parts were already in transition to something else. And with the pot scourer, by expanding, cutting and flattening it, it got to a point where it took new form. So, the how would be through experimentation, play, curiosity and following cues from the material and its existing structure.

MM: When I think about the story behind your 2021 solo exhibition ‘I turn myself into a star and visit my loved ones in the sky’ at the White Cube in London; cynicism has been designed to inform the initial response to the show’s concept. Are validations of the mythical important to you?

BK: I’m not trying to validate the mythical, I just believe in mythology. I’m interested in astrology because it's a combination of mythology and the patterns in the stars, which is evident in my work. I’m also interested in mythmaking as a way of making sense of the world. For instance, the work that I made for the Venice Biennale titled Goegoe was referencing a tale my grandfather shared with me about a mythical snake who lived in a river. The snake had a diamond for an eye, went to sleep, and a man stole the diamond. When the snake woke up it was blind, and it started destroying everything around it. That makes me think of the first diamond findings in Kimberley and the shiny stones found by the Vaal River which propelled the diamond digging. And then I think about the big hole dug in the centre of Kimberly, that the city was built around which is starting to crumple in on itself owing to human neglect and ecological factors. I start to create links between the story my grandfather retold and the current reality of the place. I recognise how this myth foretold something about the future. And I think many myths do.

MM: How does place influence your work?

BK: My reality has been that when you are in a space, you are of that space through ingesting, breathing and drinking water from it. This informs my understanding of how occupying a space means you are in conscious or unconscious conversation with it. So, for that reason, what I make speaks to place. In recent years, I’ve been influenced by the stories told by the ocean or weather for instance. It's knowing that my physicality is in conversation with the physicality of where I am and paying close attention to the information I’m receiving.

MM: Can you share what ‘stone's embrace, a love spiral of erosion and renewal’ means to you?

BK: It means that I’ve realised that the Earth really loves me, I feel so loved. It's my reflection of knowing its generosity in the support it gives me in my complex humanness. We are on a stone that supports us being here, that feels loving and magical. I’ve spent the last two years in nature and accessed the transformative properties of the water in cultivating a personal relationship with the ocean. I’m waking up to the alignment and knowing that none of us are separate from the land. We are of the Earth.

MM: In your solo exhibition ‘/ // ! ǂ’ with Blank Projects, you presented your imagined creole language. The way in which !KhāIIaeb (Flowering season) is placed within your current exhibition feels like a continuation of your imagining language into being and transcription. Am I correct in this?

BK: Definitely, I think that all the works are. My Blank show was me coming into an understanding that I was creating a mode of communication and language even with my earlier works. I also understand why you read this in !KhāIIaeb (Flowering season) because of its structure, similarities to text and it being on a white wall like symbols. The exhibition at Blank also came at a time when I was having great difficulty in trying to learn !Ora and in the process of giving up. I thought that maybe if I inserted !Ora into my work, it would be a way of learning the language, which could possibly take me a lifetime. In speaking about the African American experience, David Hammons said that loss presents the potential of creating something new. So, in this sense the loss of not being able to speak my ancestral language creates this potential to create, to incorporate a record of me making something new for this and that being the work.

MM: Can you share the rationale of having the Soetdoring tree within the exhibition?

BK: This type of Soetes (Sweetness) tree grew in my yard and I wanted people to see it so they can attach their memories. I wanted to honour the tree, give it a stage for us to admire and understand its worth. I wanted it to be in the space for us to study, spend time with and have it listen to the audio recording.

MM: The rose quartz takes prominence in the works, we see it cradle the bark, rest in the soil beneath the tree and take on varied postures. Could you elaborate on the love you are speaking to?

BK: I’m weary of giving the rose quarts more prominence than the other stones because I think they are on equal ground. They all bring a very specific energy to the show, the stones found by the ocean are charged by it, so the ocean is in the space through the stones. The ones that had been charged by rain or water in my studio, bring that charge from the rain. The iron ore brings the familial history of mining and wounds close to home. The rose quartz has a more defined history as stones that clear space and promote love. So even before I co-opted them, they already had this understanding of them, which makes them great agents because people can make quick readings. But all of the stones present have a charge of love; I see stones as magical capsules and signifiers of time. They are good storytellers of the Earth, change and transformation.