Mark Rautenbach

The Butterfly works are all commissions. The material, the paper for the butterflies, comes from the client; it is their matter, their content. I have made butterflies from, children's drawings, love letters, certificates, contents of deceased estates, memories. The commission becomes a ‘portrait’ of the client or the family or the couple, whatever the situation. During the making of the work I become quite psychologically and psychically involved with who ever the portrait is about. This is the alchemical/shamanic process of the work, taking base matter [paper] and transforming into something higher [beauty/art].

Butterfly works are all commissions. The material, the paper for the butterflies, comes from the client; it is their matter, their content. I have made butterflies from children's drawings, love letters, certificates, contents of deceased estates, memories.

Once the commission is complete I there are some butterflies left over. I collect them. This series; Last of the Butterflies are these collected butterflies. They fly off into other spaces, cross pollinating, bringing their stories to join other stories.

They are loosely part of the [w]HOLE[e]ARTH series which uses the circle as a symbol of togetherness, integration and wholeness.

2016 commission for The Shortmarket Club [Luke Dale-Roberts protégé Wesley Randles new restaurant in Cape Town].

http://shortmarketclubcommission.blogspot.co.za/

The Butterflies are made by burning pieces of paper into the shape of butterfly-wings. The papers comes from, and belongs to, the restaurant. They are menus, shopping lists, floor plans, holiday pics of the managers, till slips, media, pics of the pets of the staff, etc.