Brilliant Eris Silke paints straight from the heart

SUZANNE BELLING

PHOTOGRAPH SUPPLIED

Pictured: Artist Eris Silke.

An exhibition of her latest work will open at the Art.b Gallery at the Bellville Library, Cape Town, on August 31, with a private viewing the day before.

“Make of my birthplace what you will,” Eris laughs, but goes on to say that she is the daughter of Hungarian Holocaust survivors, who beat the Nazi machine by happenstance – living beyond the actual borders of Hungary and, as Zionists, settling in Israel after the establishment of the State.

Silke, an only child, retreated into her art from the age of five. She represented her country as Miss Israel in the late 1960s. Her undeniable talent has been acclaimed, although self-taught. Her painting overtook her initial studies in Hebrew literature and law and her graduation as a psychology major.

Her first marriage at the age of 18 forced her to leave the army. Then she and her husband, the late Professor Israel Ben-Yosef, former head of Judaica at UCT, came on shlichut to South Africa. She was even a rebbetzen for a short while when her husband was acting rabbi in Springs!

Silke moved to Cape Town after a divorce, was remarried for many years, a marriage that produced her only son, Robert, a well-known Cape Town architect.

She knew she wanted to be an artist and since she turned professional in 1975, she has incorporated all the different aspects of her life into her work – literature, political influences, deep psychological understanding, spirituality, Judaism, pain, pleasure, the macabre and the cruel, the bizarre and the beautiful…

Her psychological insight manifested in her work, particularly the influence of Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud in her early works.

“For me there is lots of beauty in the world but there is also pain and darkness,” says Silke. “I paint as my heart dictates, as a true artist as opposed to meeting modern demands of commercialism in order to eke out a living.”

Among her paintings are characters from the Bible, following on her earlier themes of European and Yiddish culture.

“There is so much beauty in our Bible and beliefs, coupled with deep psychological meaning – as with Joseph and his brothers and the analysis of what led Pharaoh to believe Joseph’s dream.”

She is also engrossed in the fictional works of great writers, especially Edgar Allan Poe. Then there is the fantasy – the ever-present porcelain dolls, which surround her in her studio in Sea Point. They are at times pretty, then suddenly their fragility is shattered like broken china, depicted as a crack on their faces.

Her paintings – acrylic on canvas – and her drawings reflect her cosmopolitan and unconventional lifestyle and show glimpses into the soul of the artist herself.

Silke has over 30 solo exhibitions to her credit. Her paintings have been shown at most of the biggest galleries in the country and at other venues.

Her paintings are in the SA National Gallery, Stellenbosch Museum, the UCT Library, College of Music, a women’s residence and more recently at Serendipity and Burr and Muir antique collections.

She appears in “The Dictionary of South African Painters and Sculptors” and “150 South African Painters” (1990).