Now I Get It: A journey with the sculptor Brendon Edwards
Written in January 2024.
Brendon Edwards has been an artist and sculptor for decades – and, in the past five years, his perseverance has begun to pay off. His journey has taken him from exhibiting at The Everard Read Gallery in Johannesburg, to various commissions in Franschhoek and Kwa-Zulu Natal, to establishing his studio on Mount West in uMgungundlovu in the KZN Midlands.
He and his partner, Michelle, live in a majestically situated home on the slopes of the mountain where they run a thriving guest house and function venue.
But it wasn’t always this way. Going back some years, I asked myself what my friend, the sculptor, was getting up to? I heard that he had found a dramatic location in which to build his studio. And where could that be? Where the earth fuses with the sky, of course. When Brendon first mentioned to me that he and Michelle had bought property on the west-facing side of Mount West in the KZN Midlands, I was curious and went to visit. As we parked the 4 x 4 on the dirt road at the start of the 70-hectare slope, I commented on the view of the Drakensberg from that vantage point. Brendon trained his calloused hand high above his shoulder. ‘That’s nothing,’ he said, his cobalt eyes glinting and his prominent jawline thrust skywards. ‘Wait until we’re up there!’ We began trudging along a rudimentary cattle path which eventually wound its way up the mountain.
Not for a moment did I think that this was to be the location of his studio and home. We were on foot and out of breath due to the steepness of the climb. Brendon’s signature vintage Barbour jacket was billowing in the wind, his Akubra veld hat pulled down tight on his head. Near the top, just below the Dolomitic cliffs, Brendon proclaimed like some tin-pot Caesar: ‘See this plateau? I’m going to build my venue, studio and home right here!’
It was only years later, once the basic venue structure had been completed, that he finally convinced me of his vision. Although they were not yet open for business, I decided to visit for a weekend. I drove up a spine-chilling series of cement-strip oxbows that snake up the side of Mount West. Slippery in the dense fog and eerie at night, this driveway is not for the timid or faint-hearted. If your let the noise in your head run unchecked, your imagination could easily run you off the cliff.
An hour after sunset, we were sitting on the decades-old, chocolate-brown lounge furniture that also served as the dog’s bed. Last light is later up there and a thunderstorm was brewing. ‘You just gotta see the storms up here!’ Brendon declared, pouring us whiskeys and opening the double-volume glass doors, the sound of screeching metal echoing through the space. I relaxed into the battered old chair thinking that my friend was really more hillbilly than artist. I would always wear expendable clothing when visiting during those construction days. The rain began to pelt into the void. The rain is always at an angle up there. Small pools began to form on the cement floor of what I gathered would become his lounge, dance hall, party venue or art gallery. Ten or more minutes went by. We were essentially sitting in a dense rain cloud at night. The very fog was with us, between the furniture, touching my face! There was not much to say at that stage. I got up to get a blanket and gave my eccentric friend the benefit of the doubt. We spoke softly. The mood was moody and reflective.
‘Wait for it.’ Brendon had read my mind. Yes, I was becoming a little restless. He’d built up the suspense and had turned down my requests for music even though music is one of his passions – his sound system that of a professional. The night was oil black and the sound of light rain dominated the space. I was on the brink of getting bored. I live in Johannesburg, you see. I know what a real electric storm looks like. That’s why he had me sitting here – a country bumpkin wanting to upstage my world view. I continued to politely humour my host.
It was then that Brendon’s vision finally struck home. Maybe one kilometre in front of us, an explosion occurred of the most extraordinary power that I could ever imagine. Up until that moment, I thought that I had experienced the most powerful thunderstorm that nature could offer. But in that instant, the pink phosphorus flash from the lightning temporarily blinded me and illuminated the void like the glow of a monstrous electrical substation blowing up. A sulphurous smell saturated the room. How shocking, how enigmatic, how sensory!
‘You see! you see!’ Brendon was like a chimp on the couch.
I was momentarily speechless. Now I got it. Brendon wanted to live at eye level with the engine room of nature’s arc welder. Streaks of lightning shot horizonal gashes across the night sky. Normally one sees lightning striking from top to bottom. No! Only Brendon would build a steel structure on the highest point outside of the Drakensberg mountains in an attempt to be close to his mentor. I reached for my sunglasses and marvelled at the martial theatrics.
I get a strong sense of authenticity from Brendon’s decision to follow through with this risky venue. It would have been easy to build near the dirt road at the entrance to the farm. It would have been quaint and scenic and so chocolate box. He could have cast bronze fish or a bronze sunbird in flight. Had he done so, there wouldn’t have been financial challenges – galleries would have been clamouring to stock the souvenirs for the Midlands Meander. But where would that have left the truth of the sculptor? Brendon’s sculptures are a risk. There is integrity in honest creativity, he once said to me. He built on the mountain precisely because it flouted convention.
* * *
On a sunny day, I gaze out on the vista ahead of me, a green belt cascading down the mountain to the horizon. To my right is a three-metre-high piece of bent I-beam. No, my mistake! It is actually a sculpture. There is something incongruent about it. The angle somehow annoys me, just a couple of degrees inclined toward the gradient. It makes me focus, though. I remind myself that the definition of bad art is art that never lures you in for a second glance. I look a second time. What on Earth is this thing about, other than being a piece of rusted farm scrap? I can’t help thinking that it has been carelessly installed and that now, because of the rain, the sculpture is lopsided. Before I turn away to make coffee, I tell myself that it resembles a giant rusted coat hanger that has been run over by a truck.
Coffee is always a ritual in Brendon’s studio. The time-saving aspect of instant coffee is anathema to the sculptor. Some things just have to take time. You either make plunger coffee or you drink water. He once bemoaned to me the complicated logistics of constructing a five-ton sculpture using cranes and scaffolding. ‘Buddy,’ I said with conviction, ‘just make the damn thing a third of the size.’ I got a dirty look. I suppose I’m just too practical in this regard, which is why I’m a book dealer and not a sculptor.
We finish dinner – a most delicious meal of lamb ribs in lemon juice and spices with baked potatoes. Did I mention that Brendon is also a brilliant chef? ‘Let’s sit outside on the grass,’ someone suggests. The night sky is Karoo clear. Not a speck of cloud in sight as we crane our heads to the heavens. All light pollution from the house has been extinguished and there we are on the edge of Mount West. That’s right – not another Midlands hill, but a mountain. I am practically among the stars.
A flash of movement catches my eye. There, silhouetted against the backdrop of the bejewelled night, the buckled coat-hanger sculpture bobs. I scan the stars above it and find that my gaze drops to the midnight-black sculpture. I am intrigued. The gentle rise and dip of the shape has my attention, I admit. The more I take in the space, the surroundings, the humbling sky, I find my gaze fixating on this steel object reacting to nature. It is bowing to the horizon, exactly where the sun disappeared beneath the edge of the Earth. The katabatic winds have breathed life into what, until this moment, was an inert object. Previously, I’d viewed and judged the sculpture out of context. It is only in this moment that I truly get it. I stand up to greet the praying structure.