The Troubled History of Blue
South African artist Lady Skollie explores the color blue from it's earliest uses to it's difficult past
Portrait of artist Lady SkollieDesign Indaba
Introducing Lady Skollie
Lady Skollie (born Laura Windvogel) is a feminist artist and activist from Cape Town, South Africa. Filled with bold color, god-like figures and suggestive fruits, Lady Skollie’s work revolves around themes of gender, sex and the politics of lust, as well as her musings on identity.
Impending Doom Approaching (2020) by Lady SkollieDesign Indaba
In her work Impending Doom, Lady Skollie explores the complexities of South Africa's history and her identity through the color blue.
The color blue, more importantly cobalt, has a long royal history. From being the most expensive pigment for paint (Lapis Lazuli) to being the color carrying away enslaved people to the newfound world, drowning in the depths, forgotten, thrown overboard, enveloped for all eternity eternity by the deepest, darkest blue.
In speaking about the work, Lady Skollie evokes Cape Town’s famous Table Mountain, one of the first sites enslaved people would have seen as the ships approached the shore.
In speaking about the work, Lady Skollie evokes Cape Town’s famous Table Mountain, one of the first sites enslaved people would have seen as the ships approached the shore.
The color of the sky above Table Mountain as white washing approaches. The tides bring more people from everywhere all speaking in different tongues and Susanna Een Oor van Bengal (Susanna One Ear from Bengale) swirls in blue to the bottom of Table bay in a woven hessian sack.
