in ya face!

Sydney Biennale Report.

"Conrad Botes’ work looks at abuses of power and repression with a distinctive comic style and dark sense of humour. His irreverent explorations of human vice and existential torment reflect a particular experience of growing up as a white South African under apartheid, while his strong symbolic language, which references the Bible, comic books and folk art, transmits a broad appeal. Botes has worked as an illustrator and is also known for his association with Bitterkomix magazine an independent comic published in Cape Town featuring satirical sociopolitical content and often explicit imagery that was founded by Botes with Anton Kannemeyer in 1992."

David Brodie, ‘Conrad Botes’, 10 years 100 Artists: Art in a Democratic South Africa, Sophie Perryer (ed.), Bell-Roberts, Cape Town, 2004, pp. 58–59.

I really appreciate his work, as it is a style I wish to incorporate into my own works, it’s simple yet sophisticated but I feel it is quite effective in the messages he is trying to convey.