AGAC 2024 Top 25 Finalist - Jan Christiaan Bölke - Mama Lizbeth

Originally from Pretoria in South Africa, Bölke graduated with a degree in Fine and Applied Arts (B-Tech) in 2015. He continued on to receive his PGCE in Fine and Applied Art in 2016. After his studies he went on to teach Visual art in Both South Africa, Kuwait and China. During his time in South Africa he has participated in Group exhibitions and also worked on creating art for the American Embassy’s 4th of July party.

Bölke then returned to Cape Town in South Africa to pursue his art career. Bölke started experimenting with the Embroidery medium during his studies and has continued to experiment and work in embroidery and mixed media. Bölke has continued to Exhibit in Galleries in the Western Cape and you can find his work on permanent display at Rossouw Modern Gallery in Hermanus. In 2024 J.C. Bölke received a “Highly Recommended Artist” certificate finishing in the top just after 3rd place for Vuleke 2024 Art Competition.

“I mostly use embroidery thread in my artworks. I like that it plays with the idea of masculinity and femininity, me being a man using a traditionally craft and female medium. This could bring up questions people have of sexuality, which I sometimes use as inspiration. The process of creating my artworks using thread has become a sort of meditation, trying to capture emotions in my portraits using colour and thread and then repeating the process.”

What inspired me for the artwork was the theme “rainbow Renaissance.”. I decided to choose one of my favourite artists, Leonardo Da Vinci and one of his most famous artworks ‘The Mona Lisa’. 
Since South Africans are known as the Rainbow Nation, I decided to make my artwork colourful and put Cape Town and Table Mountain as the background of my artwork, as it is one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. I chose to use a coloured woman to represent our nation and the Cape. I also decided to add the protea flowers to make it more Capetonian and show our national flower. 

All of this represents the beauty of South Africans and our nation. We all bleed the same, we are all human, we are the Rainbow Nation.