Joe Faragher

Joe's bats in the belfry!

Encounter with unlabelled and unattributed archive images more than thirty years ago. Throughout a varied career interacting with ceramics Joe returned to play with the images. Used kiln bats abandoned on Terry Reinders' smallholding provided the canvas for these artworks. The images from the librarian's largesse all those years ago were added to as Joe explored different voices in the South African War's story. We see images of women embellished with bandoliers gripping rifles with determination and decked out in nursing uniforms tending the wounded in tents.  We see a fighting unit foregrounding the Boer soldiers amongst the boulders with Black soldiers at higher up, further from the lens and indistinct in the distance, through a sepia tint. We see the same image lurid in pinks and browns titled 'Deadly Semantics'. Are the three figures at the top of the image soldiers or civilians?  General De Wet has a starring role, spangled with stars armed with a union jack and a rifle, playing the Ace of Spades. Paul Kruger cascades across the canvas, tumbling playing cards on the verge of a Warhol treatment.

Joe has successfully completed his National Diploma of Art and Design in Ceramics, although he originally trained as a mining engineer. He was involved in the design of murals for the Lost City as well as the supervision of the manufacture of the ‘Castle Tiles’ for the Castle restoration in Cape Town. He is responsible for the murals that can be found in main banking hall of the main branch of Standard Bank Mbabane, University of Transkei’s outdoor theatre, the font and tiles for the baptistery light (All Saints Church Mbabane) and the mural on crèche in Ngangelizwe in collaboration with architect Peter Hoskin. He has been featured in Ceramic Review (magazine), the Ceramic Review Clay and Glaze Book (1977, 1981, 1984), the Ceramic Monthly (magazine)and Scraffiti (Publication of the Association for Potters in Southern Africa – APSA)

Joe continues to collaborate with artists around the country, thriving on the opportunity to explore the possibilities of clay and other media. He brings a wonderful talent for developing artistic possibilities in those slow to consider themselves artists. He has also been instrumental in the founding and managing a variety of projects including production plants and studios providing employment for the community. He has as worked closely with as members of the community that are mentally or physically disabled, establishing studios and conducting workshops.    

Information courtesy of the artist’s family.