Artwork Description
"Stratification II" brings us uncomfortably close to the face. Corné Eksteen builds the portrait from overlapping passages of warm terracotta, rust, pink, black and pale flesh tones, breaking and reassembling the features across the canvas. The eyes remain strikingly direct, even as the rest of the face seems to shift around them.
There is something compelling about the push and pull between recognition and disruption. From across a room, you read the work immediately as a portrait; up close, individual marks, layers and interruptions begin to take over. At 80 × 80 cm, it has enough scale to hold a wall without overwhelming the space.
Painted in oil on a 2.5cm deep stretched canvas, Stratification II is an original contemporary portrait by South African artist Corné Eksteen, available for R27,850.
