{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O1769228"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1769228/"}},"images":null,"see_also":null},"record":{"systemNumber":"O1769228","accessionNumber":"E.1408-2023","objectType":"print","titles":[{"title":"Memories of District Six","type":"assigned by artist"}],"summaryDescription":"Lionel Davis was born in Cape Town in 1936 in the District 6 neighbourhood, and is now aged 87. He was arrested in 1964 and sentenced to seven years on Robben Island for conspiracy to commit acts of sabotage. During his sentence he met Nelson Mandela, then a fellow prisoner.\r\nAfter his release he was restricted under a banning order and house arrest until 1976. At the Evangelical Art and Craft Centre at Rorke’s Drift in 1980 he worked toward a Diploma in Fine Arts. Night school introduced Davis to the Non European Unity Movement (NEUM), African Peoples Democratic Union of South Africa (APDUSA), and the National Liberation Front, an APDUSA faction led by Neville Alexander. His interest in art led him to complete a BA Fine Art degree with the University of Cape Town in 1994. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Cape Town in 2024.\r\nDavis has worked much of his career as an educator, particularly in community-based children’s education, alongside his creative practice. He exhibited several times from 1981 to 1987, also in Gaborone, Botswana and Pine Plains, New York, USA. Lionel held his first solo exhibition at The Gill Allderman Gallery in April 2008.\r\nThis linocut represents a strand of Davis's work which feature convincing portrails of ordinary peoply going about thier daily tasks, incorporating domestic and street scenes with text in English and Afrikaans, which are representative of Davis’s work and political outlook. \r\nDavis’s work is located within the context of the reconstruction of a community displaced and destroyed by apartheid, rendering the work inherently political. Mario Pissarra has described in Art Africa magazine how Davis’s politics are “manifest through his empathy for people dealing with the challenges of being alive, being hungry, being depressed or just coping, passing time, waiting…”.\r\n","physicalDescription":"Monochrome linocut on paper","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Davis, Lionel","id":"AUTH398824"},"association":{"text":"artist","id":"AAT25103"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"","id":""},{"text":"paper","id":"x30308"}],"techniques":[{"text":"linocut","id":"AAT60720"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Linocut on paper","categories":[{"text":"Prints","id":"THES48903"}],"styles":[],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":[],"imageResolution":"","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLE","id":"THES49657"},"free":"","case":"MP","shelf":"58","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"print","id":"AAT41273"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""},"note":""},{"place":{"text":"Cape Town","id":"x38584"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""},{"place":{"text":"District Six","id":"THES393233"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1994","earliest":"1994-01-01","latest":"1994-12-31"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"","dimensions":[],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[],"objectHistory":"","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Linocut by Lionel Davis, \"Memories of District Six\", 1994","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Mario Pissarra for ART AFRICA magazine, 14th October 2014: https://artafricamagazine.org/awakenings-impulses-and-threads-in-the-art-of-lionel-davis/  "}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[{"text":"District Six","id":"THES393233"}],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["E.1408-2023"],"accessionNumberNum":"1408","accessionNumberPrefix":"E","accessionYear":2023,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2025-04-07","recordCreationDate":"2023-11-13","availableToBook":false}}