“Chapter 3” is our latest group exhibition at AITY Gallery, curated in celebration of the Franschhoek Literary Festival taking place from Friday 15 May to Sunday 17 May.
Bringing together a diverse selection of artists and visual narratives, the exhibition explores storytelling through colour, form, texture, and symbolism — reflecting the spirit of literature, dialogue, and imagination that defines the festival weekend.
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AITY Gallery, Franschhoek, is pleased to announce Chapter 3, a group exhibition opening this Friday, during the Franschhoek Literary Festival weekend, 15 May 2026 to 17 June 2026. The third in an ongoing series of themed group shows, Chapter 3 brings together a group of South African artists whose work engages, each in its own way, the universe of the written word. Ranging from the intimate to the monumental - paintings, sculpture, and works on paper, all united by a quality of attention to what image and language can do when they meet. Timed to coincide with one of the country’s most celebrated cultural weekends, Chapter 3 invites viewers into a space where art and literature intertwine.
“I believe that in every brush stroke an artist’s life is depicted, that every mark put to canvas represents a lifetime of experiences imprinted silently into its shape and form, a soul whisper, a personal presence carried through the energy and the heart of the art. This silent dialogue of expression through creativity is my drive and inspiration and has contributed to a lifetime of painting.”
Bold, textured and instinctively wild, the work of Alexandra Spyratos channels the heat and spirit of African wildlife. Through layered surfaces of metals and luminous pigment, Spyratos captures the pulse of the natural world.
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‘The Muddy River’, Copper, brass leaf, acrylic, glitter on canvas, 90 x 90 cm
‘Feather Soire’, Pure dyed silver leaf/variegated copper leaf/acrylic on canvas, 144 x 180 cm
‘Strength like a Lion’, Gold copper/brass/pure dyed silver leaf/acrylic on canvas, 160 x 160 x 4 cm
‘Deep Reflections’, Pure dyed silver leaf/variegated copper leaf/dyed aluminium/glitter/acrylic on canvas, 100 x 199 cm
Winter season scenes at AITY Gallery, Franschhoek.
Nestled in the heart of the village at Heritage Square, our Franschhoek location is currently alive with and full of colourful, contemporary works curated for the season ahead.
Located at Shop 1, Heritage Square, 9 Huguenot Street, Franschhoek. Open daily.
Silent and strangely tender. In this sculpture, Allerton distils emotion into caricatured bronze, holding space for what cannot be spoken. A contemplative work fusing ancient cycladic and contemporary pop art.
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‘Mute’, Bronze Edition 12/20, 25.5 x 16.5 x 16 cm
“I’ve long been drawn to the idea of home, not simply as a place, but as a feeling.”
Working across paint, charcoal and ink. Ros Koch reimagines a home as a feeling, without a fixed location. Shaped by a life between the UK and South Africa, Ros’s practice navigates notions of belonging. Her landscapes hover at the edge of abstraction, capturing memories frozen in time.
AITY Gallery presents a dynamic dialogue between five distinct voices shaping contemporary practice:
Solomon Omogboye
Kyle Jardine
Careshia Esperanza
Jane Barnes
Chris Denovan
From layered abstraction to bold figuration, this selection explores materiality, identity, and narrative through a spectrum of approaches. Each artist brings a unique tension—between control and spontaneity, structure and emotion—creating a collective energy that is both considered and instinctive.
Now on view.
Visit us at AITY Gallery.
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Rooted in the wild grasslands beneath the Drakensberg, Falconer’s practice is shaped by an intimate connection with nature. Working in bronze, she grounds the ephemeral - gesture, prayer, and presence - into a material that endures, holding a space before language, where feeling leads and form becomes a kind of knowing.
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‘Nyanga - Moon Goddess’, Bronze Edition 2/18, 24.5 x 25 x 25 cm
‘Reflections’, Bronze Edition 3/11, 13 x 12 x 13 cm
‘Through The Looking Glass’, Bronze Edition 2/11, 29 x 22 x 6 cm
‘In Wonderland’, Bronze Edition 2/11, 15 x 11 x 8 cm
Working intuitively between the seen and unseen, Fiona Rowett’s practice unfolds through a meditative process that is simultaneously “both calm and intense.”Painting since 1975, her work spans mixed media and acrylic on paper and canvas, where landscapes and abstraction dissolve into one another through intuitive mark-making. Rather than describing the world, Rowett seeks to suggest it - layering and reworking surfaces in a search for balance, guided by her instinct and the subconscious. “I draw from life experiences and prefer to make suggestions rather than descriptions.” Her compositions emerge like fleeting impressions - “a wisp of smoke, seen and not seen” capturing moments that exist just beyond the visible.
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‘Night Splash II’, Mixed Media On Board, 30 x 30 x 4 cm
‘Storm’, Acrylic On Board, 30 x 30 x 4 cm
‘Night Splash I’, Mixed Media On Board, 30 x 30 x 4 cm
‘Winter’, Acrylic On Board, 30 x 30 x 4 cm
There are many ways to look at abstraction within art. Jane Barnes and Mariano Botas offer two distinct approaches to abstraction, differentiated through their handling of surface, structure, and spatial organisation.
Barnes builds compositions through layered applications of paint and mixed media, creating stratified surfaces where translucent and opaque passages accumulate into continuous visual fields. Her compositions are non-hierarchical, with colour and gesture distributed across the canvas in integrated, all-over structures. Mark-making is fluid and varied, with overlapping strokes and tonal shifts that dissolve into one another.
Botas, by contrast, constructs works through clearer structural articulation. His surfaces combine acrylic, enamel, graphite, and charcoal, producing strong contrasts between matte and reflective areas. Compositions often reveal segmented frameworks, with linear elements and directional gestures introducing internal structure. Colour is more compartmentalised, frequently set in defined zones or blocks that interact with drawn interventions and material contrasts.
Where Barnes prioritises continuity through layered integration, Botas emphasises division and spatial tension through juxtaposition. The result is two materially driven yet formally distinct languages of abstraction—one based on accumulation and diffusion, the other on structure and contrast.
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Jane Barnes, ‘Renewing’, Oil on Canvas, 120 x 120 x 4 cm
Mariano Botas, ‘We Exist’, Acrylic, Enamel, Graphite, Charcoal on Canvas, 100 x 100 x 4 cm
Jane Barnes, ‘Fields of Attention, Resting’, Oil paint, charcoal, Oil Stick, 160 x 110 cm
Mariano Botas, ‘Southern Storm’, Acrylic, Enamel, Graphite, Charcoal on Canvas, 152 x 140 x 4cm
“I can heal myself in terms of each and every stitch, which represents my emotions and my healing,” says Motau.
Working within fibre art, Motau constructs her figures through dense embroidery, where stitching becomes both structure and surface. Found fabrics and circular motifs—drawn from domestic life and the materials themselves inform the composition, while simplified forms and “mashangane” colour reflect both childhood perception and cultural lineage.
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‘Mosidi @76 ’, Fabric and Embroidery, 142 x 122 cm
‘The Sitholes’, Acrylic on Paper, 34 x 57 cm
‘Reneilwe @17 ’, Fabric and Embroidery, 100 x 81 cm
‘The Khumalo’, Acrylic on Paper, 38 x 57 cm
Lee-Ann Ormandy-Becker’s work unfolds in thick, sculptural oils - surfaces built up through the pushing, pulling and squeezing of paint into an emotion on the canvas. Set against a luminous blue, the yellow irises representing hope and resilience. Rooted in subconscious and mythology, Ormandy-Becker describes her process as “creating poetry through paint,” where “the hidden always influences the seen.” Here, gesture becomes language - paint pressed against, and lifted up - allowing emotion to surface with grace.
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‘Yellow Irises for Ukraine’, Oil on Canvas, 110 x 110 x 5 cm
