Contact Art
Shari Daya
The first two days were bright and then
the fog rolled in across the bay
and there we were: gone, and just
the edge of the lagoon remained
but it stayed warm, so we stayed out,
shadows of ourselves, my littlest one
a watercolour blossom in his
pink and purple swimsuit, dancing
just as if the foghorn was not grieving
all the vessels lost before
today, their slow tilt into waves
then into sand, but also perhaps
some safely landed ships, like one
soaked into rock, red ochre sails,
at Porterville, three days away –
walking – from the sea, but in
the mountains there that galleon,
triple-masted, floats, three hundred
years since a fleeing artist ground
pigment from the earth, painted
what was coming, what was already there:
the strangers, arms akimbo, and what
she did not, could not, paint: invisibly
secreted in the blankets, alien life
snug and ready for their new adventure,
the smallest pioneers, the germs,
time on their side, and riding high
into the hinterland.
Note
150km north-east of Cape Town in the Skurweberg Mountains, near Porterville, there is a representation of a three-masted sailing ship painted in red ochre called the ‘Porterville Galleon’. The detailed depiction of the vessel suggests that the artist was visually familiar with European ships. Museum curators suggest that the ship dates to the mid-seventeenth century, coinciding with the sinking of the Nieuwe Haerlem and the ‘founding’ of Cape Town. (Text adapted from the British Museum website https://africanrockart.britishmuseum.org/thematic/contact-rock-art-south-africa/)This kind of work, depicting indigenous people’s encounters with colonisers, is often referred to as ‘contact art’.
SHARI DAYA is a geographer and poet from Cape Town. Her writing, both academic and imaginative, explores experiences of place, identity, and material cultures. Her poems have been published in New Contrast and the anthology Africa! My Africa! and her research has been published in a range of academic books and journals. Shari is currently undertaking an MA in Creative Writing at the University of Cape Town.
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