Thesis (MPhil (Visual Arts. Illustration))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / The aim of this thesis is to decode my autobiographic graphic novel, Portrait in Pieces (a narrative of a mother / daughter relationship), utilising a genealogical mode of analysis. This takes place, firstly, through a discussion of the themes of photography, memory and repetition which occur in the graphic novel; secondly, through a consideration of the role of language and difference within a specific mother / daughter relationship; and thirdly, through the study of autobiography and the self as performative entities. In this thesis I interrogate the autobiographic genre in a manner that questions internalised notions of femininity and (patriarchal) cultural constructs, which precede and influence the performance of our ‘life scripts’. I posit Portrait in Pieces as a transitional object between my mother and myself, and language as a medium which can both Otherise and close the distance between us. Translation is the medium by which one reads this distance, turning miscommunication into communication, and misunderstanding into understanding. The illustrations and text constituting the graphic novel have been produced through creative play, representing the ‘post talking’ required for the process of healing, empathising, and taking ownership of one’s ‘life script’.

Thesis (Mphil (Visual Arts. Illustration))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007. / This thesis is a visual, sociolinguistic and cultural inquiry into the role of isiXhosa picture books in contemporary South Africa. From the standpoint of an illustrator, I examine several of these works arising out of a history that alienated many isiXhosa readers and writers from their language. I examine factors that influence the design, content and very notions of reading itself through the multiple languages offered by the picture book format. I argue that these books occupy a problematic space where production and consumption are affixed to paradigms of economics, language and literacy incongruent with the lives of many isiXhosa-speaking readers. My overall conclusion is that literacy and visual literacy are essential to developing an authentic 'reading culture'. Fostering a meaningful relationship with printed words and images is critical to both the emerging reader and the emerging illustrator. In producing illustrations for an isiXhosa narrative, I consider the shape of my own visual literacy through mediations with drawing and writing, relating my activities to those of a child learning to distinguish between pictures and words. The cross-over space where image/text distinctions blur potentially invites new narrative expressions. The picture book is a suitable format for expanding notions of vision and literacy, 'subverting' paradigms and revealing the richness of contemporary African tales. I rest my fundamental premise on an insistence for an increase of accessible, quality picture books in African languages that stimulate the artistic and intellectual development of all readers.

Thesis (MPhil (Visual Arts. Illustration))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009 . / This thesis investigates the historical roots of botanical illustration. It argues that far from being simply scientific representations of plants and flowers, empty of artistic comment and only accompaniments to a scientific text, botanical illustrations assisted in presenting plants brought to Europe from the colonies, in ways that influenced the easy assimilation and appropriation of these plants into European culture. The "mastery of nature", which implies an attitude of dominance by humans over nature, is discussed as symptomatic of the European colonial period. European acts and attitudes of dominance are manifest in scientific approaches toward botany, botanical illustrations and gardens. This thesis proposes that attitudes of dominance have resulted in humans being spiritually and physically separated from nature. This thesis proposes that associations of botany, flowers and botanical illustrations with the feminine have assisted in human domination over nature. In much the same way as female is dominated by male, in a human sense, so plants and flowers were pictured as feminine − replete with feminine associations of subservience, weakness and vulnerability − making a human domination of the plant world possible. The artworks produced in conjunction with this thesis, for the degree Master of Philosophy (Illustration), aim to promote a sense of human attachment to and identification with the plants painted, in opposition to the separateness from nature that is promoted by the "mastery of nature". While traditional botanical illustration, in service to modern science, promoted the supremacy of vision as a way of knowing nature, the artworks draw attention to the unseen issues around plants and the human spiritual connections with them. This thesis proposes that, in a contemporary context characterized by an environmental crisis, there is a new role to be played by botanical illustration: it is felt that botanical illustrations should emphasize human connections with the plant world, thus alerting humans to the necessity of nature for our physical, as well as spiritual, survival.

Thesis (MPhil (Visual Arts. Illustration))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / When dealing with emergent literacy in South Africa, the didactic aspects of picture books are often privileged over their aesthetic quality and the idea of reading for pleasure. The themes of the books are not always locally relevant and for economic reasons, they often fail to reach the communities that need them the most. By looking at the history of relief printing within a community environment, I hope to highlight how communities themselves may be able to develop locally relevant children’s picture books, instituting a ‘grassroots’ approach rather than the paternalistic ‘top down’ approach of the past. I will also be looking at the narrative and stylistic elements of relief printing that are complimentary to the picture book genre and how these can be utilised for a pleasurable rather than didactic approach to the narratives.

Thesis (MPhil(Visual Arts. Illustration))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007. / This thesis is a critical analysis of Afrikaans illustrated children’s Bibles as cultural texts in Afrikaner nationalist discourse. Christian Calvinism was a distinct signifier in Afrikaner nationalism and served as an instrument in the construction of Afrikaner national identity. I propose in this study that Afrikaans children’s Bibles encoded the principles of Afrikaner nationalism and were used as didactic tools for the configuration of an exclusive national consciousness. A potential pitfall in the analysis of Afrikaans children’s Bibles as nationalist texts is the fact that these books were translated from Dutch or English into Afrikaans. However, the act of translating the Bible, ‘the Word of God’, into Afrikaans served to confirm the ‘totem’ of Afrikaner Christian-Nationalism. The appropriation of the Bible re-contextualized the ‘Holy Scriptures’, placing them within the milieu of Afrikaner national identity and consciousness: language and religion thus became interrelated catalysts in the social construction of Afrikaner national consciousness. Finally, my own reinvention of the Afrikaans picture Bible – in opposition to conventional illustrated children’s Bibles – is put forward and discussed as a postmodern text that encodes a radically different post-Apartheid conception of identity.