Erika Hibbert

Erika Hibbert's work is lyrical, technically accomplished and often biographical.The political and social accents in her work are derived from her own life, so that in her work, the personal is the political. Hibbert demonstrates little interest in themes or subjects beyond her own orbit – but the surprise of the work is how the private and intimate examination of a life resonates with universal themes. In a process of understanding herself better, coming to terms with people she is connected to, and as a cathartic method of expelling her fears, she pulls and picks at her life’s experiences, measuring, weighing up and sifting, searching. Her artwork reflects a striving for balance between formal aesthetic considerations and the artist's intellectual response to relationships and events in her life.

Erika Hibbert was born in Johannesburg and completed her Fine Arts Degree at The University of Witwatersrand. In 2004 she moved to Botswana and then in 2009 she moved to the USA where she now works and exhibits. Her work is found in public, corporate and private collections around the world. She has worked with The Artists' Press since 1991.

Artists at The Artists' Press A to L (by surname)

Artists at The Artists' Press M to X (by surname)

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Below each monotype is text written by Erika Hibbert which contextualizes the work.

Guidelines for an Infant

"A pamphlet handed out to new mothers by the South African Department of Health c.1965, offers guidance on how ‘to keep baby healthy and happy’. I am dazed by the matter-of-fact approach that contradicts my own parenting experience. All of the instructions lead to the separating and the letting go, that will ultimately define good mothering." Erika Hibbert, 2018

Outlines of cupped hands below white flower with typed text page adhered to the print with semi-circular and bowl forms

Title: Guidelines for an Infant - (if awake)
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 4 050 (excl.VAT)

An offering of a Silene Stenophylla blossom to the infant, represents healing and growth, after even the most severe absence of life-lust.

Title: Guidelines for an Infant - Window Seat
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 4 050 (excl.VAT)

The infant gazes backwards into the distance, across a vast landscape. The transparent bowl and the promise of the ellipse/bay are lost on her until she turns towards the future.

Grey teething bead necklace on red sphere with typed page adhered to monoprint with blue bowl form

Title: Guidelines for an Infant - Teething
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

Teething beads for easing the pain in transformation - the beginning of the endless process of growing up.

Sleeping child's face sketch in grey ellipse with typed text page and tiltled pale blue bowl containing blood

Title: Guidelines for an Infant - Resuscitation
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 4 050 (excl.VAT)

The guidelines deal with straightforward and practical issues, and offer no help with how to convince a child that living is a good proposition. What guidelines to help bring the infant back from emotional death?

Home

Pale blue bowl shape with red circular spiked form emerging above it, centered on page.

Title: Heterotopia
Medium: Monotype
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 6 900 (excl.VAT)

A place that only exists in my dreams – where all my homes are fused and blended to become my true place.

Top of monoprint red semicicular form with radiating spikes, cupped hands outlined below with semicircle of green leaves at bottom

Title: Haint Paint
Medium: Monotype
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

The pale blue ellipse promises the absence of ghosts. The Dragon Lily binds new and old homes and loves.

Pale blue bowl shape with red circular form with spikes radiating from it emerging above it, centered on page.

Title: Hiraeth
Medium: Monotype
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 6 900 (excl.VAT)

Homesickness. Looking for ways to make the new place home.

Recipes for Disaster

Six red koeksusters floating on blue bases above large blue bowl seen from side, typed recipie page in the middle.

Title: Recipes for Disaster - Koeksisters
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

Plaiting myself into my family contexts: I am one of 3 sisters and one of 3 in my own family with my 2 daughters. The knotted bloody koeksisters refer to female identity. The large bowl, we have yet to be dunked into, appears to be void of syrup!

Tilted blue bowl with red liquid pouring out. Typed recipie page adhered to middle of monoprint.

Title: Recipes for Disaster - Alles en Nog Wat
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

The mixing bowl is weighed down with its bloody ingredients. The stain of history pours into the present.

Light blue bowl seen from side containing red liquid and red drop suspended above it.Typed recipie page adhered to middle of monoprint.

Title: Recipes for Disaster - Poeding
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

The bowl is filled with blood, but more is to come. The appalling names of some tasty desserts speak of cruelty and callousness.

Large and small grey ellipse facing each other with twist of razor wire and typed recipe text page adhered to print

Title: Recipies for Disaster - Jan Smuts Teekoekies
Medium: Monotype with chine collé
Size: 65.5 x 50.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
SOLD

The ellipse is a pan, is an arena.
The smaller ellipses are teekoekies, are my daughters.
The koekie-cutter is inadequate.
The void where my koekie has fallen away invites escape, but also suggests a free fall into the abyss.

Beads

Title: Prayerbeads
Medium: Monotype
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 4 050 (excl.VAT)

Ghost prints overlapped to fuse imagery and meaning. The razor-wire and the infant’s teething beads are in jarring contrast. Threats of violence are extended in the bloody, knotted cloth, like a shrouded corpse.

Pastel coloured elliptical forms with prayer beads, and loop of razor wire .

Title: Rosary
Medium: Monotype
Size: 50.5 x 33.5 cm
Edition size: 1/1
Price: R 4 050 (excl.VAT)

Ghost prints overlapped to fuse imagery and meaning: The razor-wire and the infant’s teething beads are in jarring contrast.

The 7 Deadly Sins

There are 7 lithographs each representing one of the 7 deadly sins as they are manifest in Hibbert's own character:
"Gluttony - The clenched hand and a wine glass refers to crude physical greed and excess. The fist indicates frustration and self-loathing.
Apathy - The Passion Flower refers to Christianity. Also called 'spiritual sloth' in some translations of Aquinas, the artist recognizes this sin in herself disguised as disdain and cynicism - and so the hand signals 'hate' in sign language.
Anger - This characteristic in the artist is identified with violence. The knife forced into flesh refers to self-mutilation - anger experienced as self-destruction.
Pride - The breastfeeding child alludes to basic, instinctual pride in one's children. Hibbert experiences this with dismay as the indication is that the children are of oneself or belong to oneself, and this claiming of another person through the sin of pride is the ultimate denial of their own individuality and separateness.
Lust - The hand raised in shock as a lizard bites its tip. Borrowed from Caravaggio, this use of the lizard as her sign for sexual passion recurs in Erika Hibbert's work. The inference is that the sin of lust may be hazardous and painful, but nevertheless, results in an exquisite serpentine gesture as the hand arches and pulls away.
Avarice - Stupid worldly greed is a green purse and a hand signalling 'love' implicates the artist in this desire to surround oneself with possessions and trappings. The artist, like Aquinas, attributes this sin to the fear of death.
Envy - The tired hand, heavy with want, contains the envious eye that desires that which others have. The mysterious sin with no benefit in it. The origin of discontent." Erika Hibbert, 2003

A series of seven prints sold as a set or as single prints.
Printed in black with additional colour runs, chine collé, embossing and hand colouring added.

Size: 38 x 35.5 cm
Edition size: 35
Price for set: R 16 000 (excl.VAT)
Price per print: R 2 600 (excl.VAT) each