1. Biography & Artist’s CV:
Faye Julia Spencer (MAFA)
Box 336
Nottingham Rd
3280
Cell: 083 9960592
Email: fayespen@gmail.com.
Website: www.fayespencer.co.za
Faye Spencer
MAFA (University of Natal; 2001) PGCE (UNISA 2004)
I a teacher and an artist specializing in 2D practice. I work in painting, drawing and
print. I am interested in artists books too and recently one of my projects includes
the illustration and layout of a novel I have written. I have taught art practical and
theory at High School level as well as been involved in workshops and outreach
projects with learners in Pre-primary and primary schools in the region. Between
2008 and 2015 I lectured at the Centre for Visual Art, UKZN. Narrative features
strongly in my practice and I am interested in the potential of storytelling and the
way in which its realization and disintegration can be explored. Two principal
themes underpin my practice. The first has to do with Departure: wherein I explore
absence /loss, recovery and and familial love. My practice situates itself round
catharsis and the role artmaking can play in personal and community identity. The
capacity art has for healing and reflection on loss is investigated in a series of
prints (linocut and embossing combinations), as well as in a novella with related
illustrations.
The second key theme explored in my work is that of dystopia or chaos (and
exclusion) which are features of works of the Office Politics Series. I recently
submitted a practice led PhD in which the relationship between these ideas is
explored.
Implicated in my explorations with visual arts and writing are questions
concerning:
1) medium (these are physical/ performative concerns) and
2) relevance (the function of making) and
3) larger questions concerning why we are in the world, and how to live
meaningfully in a time of disintegration. Mostly I am concerned with what we
value, and with those valuable things slipping from our grasp... I wonder how this
loss could be avoided. One way is to immortalize what is valued and precious
through painting, writing and other creative acts, and to use those wrought
images as a refrain, a mnemonic device, and as a mechanism through which to
confront reality.

2. Artists C.V.
Faye Julia Spencer (MAFA, PGCE)
Cell: 083 9960592
Email: fayespen@gmail.com
Website: www.fayespencer.co.za
Recent Exhibitions:
January 2017 ‘Departures’ Tatham Art Gallery (Shriener Gallery),
Pietermaritzburg (solo exhibition)
May 2016 ‘Raw; the Art of War’ (A group exhibition of prints from
artists across the world) Inky cuttlefish Studio gallery,
London
December 2015 ‘Hill House’ (A group exhibition of prints by lecturers
and postgraduate students), DAG, Durban
September 2015 'Power & Visual Culture' Jack Heath Gallery,
Pietermaritzburg (group exhibition)
September 2015 'Homage to the Centre for Visual Art' Tatham Art Gallery,
Pietermaritzburg (group exhibition)
Prior Exhibitions:
July 2014 ‘I did have a dream’ Durban Art Gallery (group exhibition)
February 2014 'Peripheral Visions', artSPACE durban ,Middle Gallery
(solo exhibition)

3. December 2013 'Sounds from Africa' – Gaunlan Print Base, China
(group exhibition)
July 2013 ‘What Lies Beneath’- KZNSA, main and mezzanine
(3-person exhibition with Kristin Ng & Colbert
Mashile)
April 2013 ‘Consider China’ –artSPACE durban (group exhibition)
October 2012 ‘for Juliet’-, Jack Heath Gallery, UKZN (Staff and
Postgraduate exhibition),
Oct-Dec 2012 ‘Office Politics: scenes from the sinking ship’, Tatham
Art Gallery (Shriener Gallery), Pietermaritzburg (solo
exhibition)
July 2012 ‘Lady Godiva’, Burroughs of Waltham Forest,
Inky Cuttlefish studio’s, London (group exhibition)
August 2012 ‘Godiva Awakes’, Jack Heath Gallery, UKZN,
Pietermaritzburg (group exhibition)
June -July 2012 ‘SANAA YA MAKARATASI EXHIBITION ‘,
Nairobi National Museum, Kenya (group exhibition)
November 2011 ‘The End (of the world as we know it)’, artSPACE durban
(group exhibition)
September 2011 ‘Alchemy’, Upstairs @ bamboo, Sandton, Johannesburg
(Group Exhibition)
March 2011 ‘Inspirations’, artSPACE durban (Group Exhibition)
November 2010 ‘Trust Artists: South African Artists in aid of the UKZN
UK Trust,’ St Paul’s School, Milton Gallery, London
October 2010 (in)Different, artSPACE Durban (2-person exhibition
With Vuli Nyoni)
September 2010 Staff student Show, WHAG
Kimberly (Group exhibition)

4. August 2010 ‘Found’, artSPACE durban (Group Exhibition)
June 2010 ‘Jabulisa’, Tatham Art Gallery, Pietermaritzburg (Group
exhibition)
December 2009 ‘Grand Plasto Baader Books Exhibition’, Kalied Gallery
Shoreditch, London (group exhibition: artist book
collaboration with Vuli Nyoni)
September 2009 ‘Staff and Postgraduate Exhibition’, Jack Heath Gallery
Pietermaritzburg (Group exhibition)
June 2009 ‘Wish List’- artSPACE Durban, Middle Gallery (Solo
Exhibition)
May 2009 ‘Contemporary Reflections-Tatham Art Gallery,
Pietermaritzburg (group exhibition)