This dissertation focuses on the way in which the South African artist Bettie Cilliers-Barnard managed to concretise her innermost thoughts and feelings in selected mandala paintings, specifically Mandala II (1991), Wind directions (2001) and Birds heralding the Light (2007) during the last phase of her life. The image of the mandala, which is symbolically understood to be an organisational structure of unconscious processes, is read and interpreted by means of Jungian concepts such as the individuation process and the concept of the Self. Jung was especially interested in coming to terms with the circle as characteristic of the mandala’s psychological influence on a person. In Jung’s theorising, the unconscious the creative process plays an important part in the concretisation of the psyche. Cilliers-Barnard was interested in both the nature of the creative process as well as the mandala as symbol. The dissertation emphasises the development of Cilliers-Barnard’s intuitive and spontaneous painting process and contextualises her influence in the South African art landscape. A number of parallels have been drawn between the Russian-German artist Wassily Kandinsky and Cilliers-Barnard with regard to both spiritual and intuitive artistic processes as well as the representation of the circle that is found repeatedly in paintings by both artists. In the oeuvres of both artists these approaches are a way of reproducing inner and unintentional experiences. Cilliers-Barnard added meaningful content to her works by combining ideas gleaned from her emotions, soul and mental processes. By focusing on the individuation processes in the mandalas by Cilliers-Barnard mentioned above, the dissertation sets out to demonstrate how she uses both form and content in her artworks in order to establish a type of inner dialogue. This inner dialogue, which in terms of form includes especially the circle, other geometric motifs as well as the bird, the tree and on a more abstract level the family, is used as symbolic point of departure for reading the representative artworks with the final focus on a type of simplification and summary of the convictions of her soul. / MA (History of Art), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

This dissertation focuses on the way in which the South African artist Bettie Cilliers-Barnard managed to concretise her innermost thoughts and feelings in selected mandala paintings, specifically Mandala II (1991), Wind directions (2001) and Birds heralding the Light (2007) during the last phase of her life. The image of the mandala, which is symbolically understood to be an organisational structure of unconscious processes, is read and interpreted by means of Jungian concepts such as the individuation process and the concept of the Self. Jung was especially interested in coming to terms with the circle as characteristic of the mandala’s psychological influence on a person. In Jung’s theorising, the unconscious the creative process plays an important part in the concretisation of the psyche. Cilliers-Barnard was interested in both the nature of the creative process as well as the mandala as symbol. The dissertation emphasises the development of Cilliers-Barnard’s intuitive and spontaneous painting process and contextualises her influence in the South African art landscape. A number of parallels have been drawn between the Russian-German artist Wassily Kandinsky and Cilliers-Barnard with regard to both spiritual and intuitive artistic processes as well as the representation of the circle that is found repeatedly in paintings by both artists. In the oeuvres of both artists these approaches are a way of reproducing inner and unintentional experiences. Cilliers-Barnard added meaningful content to her works by combining ideas gleaned from her emotions, soul and mental processes. By focusing on the individuation processes in the mandalas by Cilliers-Barnard mentioned above, the dissertation sets out to demonstrate how she uses both form and content in her artworks in order to establish a type of inner dialogue. This inner dialogue, which in terms of form includes especially the circle, other geometric motifs as well as the bird, the tree and on a more abstract level the family, is used as symbolic point of departure for reading the representative artworks with the final focus on a type of simplification and summary of the convictions of her soul. / MA (History of Art), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Hierdie verhandeling bestaan uit die ongepubliseerde manuskrip (gedigte) ʼn blaar hierdie boot, ʼn mini-verhandeling en ʼn tuisvervaardigde CD met ʼn paar gedigte. Die studie bespreek teoretiese terme en begrippe soos outoëtnografie, individuasie en vaslegging (imprinting), uit die vakgebiede van Sielkunde, Sosiologie, Opvoedkunde en Kommunikasiekunde. Die toepaslikheid van hierdie terme ten opsigte van geselekteerde literêre tekste word genoem en geïllustreer aan die hand van spesifieke skrywers. Daar word kortliks gekyk na die verstradisies van Sjina en Japan om die verwantskap met die Afrikaanse gedigte vas te stel. Sogenaamde “close reading” word geteleskopeer op geselekteerde verse uit ʼn blaar hierdie boot. ENGLISH : This dissertation consists of an unpublished anthology of poetry, ʼn blaar hierdie boot and a dissertation of limited scope, together with a home-recorded CD of poems. The study takes stock of theoretical terms and concepts like autoethnography, individuation and imprinting from the disciplines of Psychology, Sociology, Education and Communication. The relevance of these terms regarding selected literary texts is illustrated by the mention of specific authors and poets. A brief view on poetry traditions in China and Japan is offered, to illustrate the relation to Afrikaans poetry in general and the candidate’s poems in particular. So-called close reading is applied to selected poems from ʼn blaar hierdie boot Additional information available on a CD, stored at the Merensky Library on Level 3 Copyright / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Afrikaans / unrestricted