A top 1% Visual Arts IEB result from Beaulieu College!
Vikayra Govender is the proud achiever of a top 1% IEB result in Visual Arts. This wonderful achievement is the result of thorough work and a lot of dedication. Vikayra produced lovely visual journals, and her creative processes led to unusual and original solutions.
Her striking year works commented on the colonialisation of India by Britain. “From Riches to Rags: A History lesson” speaks of the advantage taken of the Indian nation: they had to produce goods for Britain, of which the most notable is tea. Vikayra used a top to bottom narrative – at the top is a proud, golden torso, lifted high, clad in embellished Indian clothing, but gradually the gold gets replaced by tea bags till only rag like and dislocated teabags are left at the bottom.
Her drawing “Spill the tea” tells the story of how in the 1670’s, the British East India Company became the most powerful monopoly the world has ever known – and tea was its primary commodity. A poor Indian woman with an empty water vessel is depicted while tea from a teapot overwhelmingly spills tea leaves out all around her, burying her deep in the pit it has created. The drawing is done by using different strengths of diluted tea.
Her final IEB exam artwork titled “A (w)hole being” was of a floating, dislocated male body, a falling Icarus-like figure, envisioning 2020, showing how the normal “cast in stone” expectations crumbled up – exactly what Covid caused.
The Visual Arts matrics of 2020 has an unusually challenging year but achieved a proud 76% average. Shows you what a bit of stress can do!
Akhona Mwelase (Matric 2020) achieved a well-deserved A for Visual Arts. Her drawing titled “The Paradigm of the Patriarchy” deals with patriarchy, which is one of the strongest societal structures that exist. Paradigms refer to patterns. Patriarchy can easily become a toxic pattern that causes the abuse and diminishing of women. Layers of black ink hues symbolise the multi-layered problems that patriarchy brings: victims mostly go nameless and faceless yet increasing numbers of women fade deep into a dark hole, piling up. Their existence simply becomes another statistic.
Her work proves that Visual Arts pupils have a platform to communicate visually and may inspire change!
