Julia Anastasopoulos - Cape Town Mural

(above) Detail: Cape Town Civic Centre IRT Station Mural by Julia Anastasopoulos, 2010 (click to enlarge)

Cape Town artist, Julia Anastasopoulos recently completed installation of a massive, finely detailed mural at the Civic Centre Station of the new IRT (Integrated Rapid Transit). If you're near, have a good look. Meanwhile, these images will give you an idea. Its packed with Cape Town character and landmarks, with a sense of innocence, warmth and wonder. Explore and enjoy.

Currently, there are few images of this piece online so I've erred towards more here, including some of my snaps in situ for a sense of scale. The huge whimsical cityscapes extend for many metres inside and outside the station.

I took the opportunity to ask her a few questions about her art.

Bollemakiesie: What’s an artist?

Julia: Someone who gets to use their imagination for a living. Someone inspired and who inspires.

What are you?

I’m a bit of a creative balancing act, but I guess an artist would cover it. I’m very lucky.

What do you tell people you do?

I dread the question and generally mumble something about being either an artist or a designer, in fear of being perceived as pretentious. Isn’t it funny how we do that? Then I kick myself and wish I had said, “I’m an artist!” with a flourish and a twirl, without thinking twice.

How did/do you develop your skills/style?

I’ve been drawing these funny little characters for as long as I can remember. I found some drawings that I drew when I was about 8 and you would recognize them as mine. From there it has just developed in time on its own, I draw on everything, all the time. Hand me that fine liner.

What inspires you?

Beautiful children’s books, people, architecture, Raymond Peynet and Saul Steinberg.

How would you describe your work to someone who’s blind?

Fantastical, intricate, playful line drawings that you can get lost in.

What do you do a lot that you don’t normally mention to people?

I secretly eat those really processed white cheesy bread rolls from Woolies.

What do you recommend as creative juice?

A day at a bookshop or the Milnerton market.

How long did the mural at the station take you?

It took approximately three months from inception to completion. The illustrations took a few weeks, even though they were made on a smaller scale.

How did you approach it?

With much anxiety! But I had a really amazing team who I wouldn’t have managed without. There was a lot of photographic research, mapping and brainstorming. And google earthing, believe it or not. It’s a brilliant reference tool.

(above) Section of Interior Panel

(above) Exterior Panel: Future. (Click to enlarge)

(above) Detail: Bo-Kaap

What was the brief?

To create an artwork for the large double-sided walls under the Civic Centre bridge. The nature of the wall surfaces needed to be taken into consideration as well as the location’s particular history and context. I made four representations of a Cape Town cityscape; “looking forward and looking back in space and time” was my concept.

What ways do you express your creativity

In whatever ways I can, I’m constantly re-arranging furniture, making things out of found objects. I draw little comics and make stop frame flash animations. I am also a performer.

How do people find out about you?

You can contact me at Julia.knolc@gmail.com, or visit www.knolc.withtank.com

Where are you going?

To Paris! At the end of the month. I can’t wait.

What do you want to be doing next year?

I want to develop a range of mural wallpaper, and open up a shop. I also want to complete the children’s story I’ve started. I don’t think it will have any words, only pictures.

What would you love to do that you’ve never done yet?

Ride in a hot air balloon.

Have you got a dream?

I would love to design and build a house.

(For more of Julia's art, see knolc link at right or here.)

Time out

Completing an intensive phase of work & creativity created a great sense of relief and release today. And gratitude at the opportunity to catch up on some sleep! Later, while driving a route I seldom take at a time I usually avoid (rush hour), I saw a township football team training in the patch of space between highways, running up a green slope in multicoloured shirts. Children noodling on an unkempt verge by pastel coloured houses. Men and women walking home with an easy sense of lightness in their pace, not the urgency of morning. And Table Mountain in the rearview mirror. (I have great big scenic side mirrors on my van, its previous owner warned me against getting too distracted by them.) And all under a rosy golden sky... should be the name of a country music artist. Anyway, it affirmed a sense of love for a place that is a privilege and an opportunity to feel.

So if you want to feel something good my suggestions include:
Throw yourself wholeheartedly into accomplishing or completing something, the relief when you are done can be its own reward.
Be open to going somewhere you don't usually go or at a time you don't usually go there, and see what's happening. What are people doing? What do you see?
My observation (not groundbreaking I confess) is that near sunset is a good time to go anywhere. Softening light. Visible change. Glowing colour.
And notice what's around you. We spend a lot of time in our heads, in memory of the past and projection or anticipation of the future. Come back to earth sometimes and soak in the pleasing freedom between.

Street Art - Faith47 - bread & land

Just saw this new artwork on Albert Rd today and synchronously see it on Faith's great art blog.
Since the City of Cape Town passed a bylaw making graffiti illegal (and making building owners liable), there seems to be more street art then ever. With beautiful and powerful pieces like this punctuating the city, bring it on.