Conversations with Place: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Art Jewellery as Translative Practice in the Groot Drakenstein, South Africa

Abstract

This practice-based study is situated at the intersection of art jewellery, translation studies, and critical conversations about land (particularly farmland) in the contemporary South African landscape. I use my art practice to explore the potential of art jewellery to act as a medium that can translate and embody the South African landscape. I draw from my experiences in the Groot Drakenstein area in the Western Cape where I currently reside, as well as the farm where I lived as a child in the Eastern Cape, to investigate how jewellery objects can act as meaningful markers of both place and identity and reveal the intricate connections between humans and their natural environment.

I am particularly interested in the potential of translation to move beyond the parameters of language and text (and two-dimensional modes of representation, such as paintings or photographs) to the three-dimensional, sensorial and experiential. Translation studies are foundational in the context of this study, and I draw on texts by theorists Sherry Simon, Edwin Gentzler, Susan Bassnett and Kobus Marais to contextualise the current movement in translation studies that advocates for a diversified view of translation that is transdisciplinary, multimodal, intralingual and intersemiotic. In this regard, I contextualise the influence that translation in its various and diverse forms has on the way that places or landscapes are perceived.

I provide an overview of the polemics surrounding land and ownership in South Africa whilst drawing on autoethnography to demonstrate a need for more diverse translations of the South African landscape. In this regard, I discuss the distinction between land as a commodity and place as something that is immersive, personal, and relational. I then move into a discussion of art jewellery as markers of place by investigating the work of jewellery artists Beth Legg and Patricia Domingues. Their work contextualises my own art practice, in which I produce jewellery pieces that stem from a bodily engagement with and translation of a particular place. I draw on the theories of Tim Ingold Laura Marks and Elizabeth Grosz to discuss art jewellery not only as the embodiment of a place but also as a medium that allows for the internalisation of place.

This study comprises the realisation of a practical body of artwork and an accompanying thesis, which are interdependent and integrated, reflecting my research process and conceptual concerns. Through an enacted, practice-based research methodology, I promote active bodily and sensory engagement with place to produce my findings. I emphasise the importance of sensory experiences and advocate for a sensory-rich approach to scholarship that fosters an immersive and interconnected perspective on translation-through-making.