Legacy Exhibition – Working Life in South Africa: Gerard Sekoto & Lena Hugo at Strauss &Co. in Johannesburg is a must-not miss art feast

When it opened at the three weeks ago it attracted high-powered audience that included top academics and business leaders at the art auction house’s Houghton offices. CITYLIFE/ARTS was there to witness the occasion that included guest being served a sumptuous dinner.

By Edward Tsumele, CITYLIFE/ARTS Editor

When you enter the Strauss &Co.’s gallery in Houghton, Johannesburg, right in front of you, you will come face to face with three artworks that look familiar, making you feel like you have seen the colourful scenes depicted by the pieces before. Well, you may not have seen them before actually, but you definitely may know the artist.

At least his signature style. These three works, the first one on your far-right titled Labourers in Sophiatown, the one in the middle, titled Poverty in the Midst of Plenty and the last one on the far left titled The Donkey Cart, are artworks created by the late legendary South African painter Gerard Sekota, painted in his earlier years before he went to self-exile in Paris, where he passed on in 1993.

These works depict the life of workers, or rather black people struggling to make a life in the big city in Johannesburg as menial labourers, having left their rural areas for what promised to be a better life in Johannesburg where gold had just been discovered, luring many from outside the country and from the hinterland of rural South Africa seeking a fortune. However, not many achieved their aim, but instead worked in low paying jobs such as domestic workers for white families and as cheap labour in mines and factories.

“Strauss &Co. is currently compiling a list of UJ’s art collection numbering !800, cataloguing it and taking pictures of each and every art work in the collection. While I was doing so, I came across these three artworks, which depict workers. I found out that these three artworks were originally owned by Nimrod Ndebele an academic (who worked at the University of Cape Town in years gone by), who passed on these artworks to his son Professor Njabulo Ndebele, who in turned loaned these artworks to the University of Johannesburg permanently.

I then researched further the work of Gerard Sokoto and found out that he created more works depicting workers. This is when the idea of creating this exhibition, pairing Gerard Sekoto and Lena Hugo, who also created a lot of work also depicting workers came from,” said Wilhelm van Rensburg. He is Senior Art Specialist and Head Curator at Strauss &Co.

Van Rensburg further has this to say about this exhibition.

“The aim of the exhibition is to present, through a selection of paintings by Sekoto, the nature of work and the world workers created for themselves in the first half of the 20th century, juxtaposed with Lena Hugo’s depictions of workers in the 21st century.” 

He was speaking earlier this month, April 8, 2025 at the opening of Legacy Exhibition – Working Life in South Africa:Gerard Sekoto & Lena Hugo. This is an annual event that sees the leading auction house in Africa mount an exhibition whose thrust is educational. Van Rensburg is at the helm of this series of annual exhibitions, and is known for his innovative way of curating this series of shows, that are thought provoking as they pair South African artists from different generations, such as the case in this exhibition.

Hugo is much younger than Gerard Sekoto, and in fact she went to university the year when Sekoto died in 1993. She told a group of journalists and invited guests during the official opening of the exhibition later on the day when prompted to speak by Strauss &Co.’s Managing Executive Susie Goodman, who officially declared the exhibition open.

The opening of this exhibition, which is poised to attract many an art lover mainly because of the innovative way of pairing two artists from two different generations, who remarkably created work whose motif is ordinary workers toiling to eke a living in an unfamiliar and harsh urban environment, was expertly conceived and curated by van Rensburg. Though of course Sekoto is the pull factor that will lead many to want to see this exhibition for the two months that it is on at Strauss &Co.’s head office in Johannesburg, Hugo takes a good account of herself in the way she created figures of workers against the background of newspaper cuttings.

During the opening, it was clear that as much as the guests admired Sekoto more, Hugo too earned the respect of many among these high-powered guests that included business people, academics and the media. The event itself became a huge event that was well planned and executed, including serving guests sumptuous dinner later in the evening. The art scene in Johannesburg needs more of these as definitely this one not only offered an opportunity for these guests to view at leisure and admire a well curated exhibition, but also an opportunity to network with like-minded people as they discussed art and more art while enjoying a great meal and drinks.

But, these high-powered guests, are not the only ones that will enjoy viewing this compelling exhibition.

“Because the thrust of this series of exhibition is educational, we are going to host a group of students and learners from a number of institutions, including Imbali an impactful visual art school that is in Johannesburg) and the University of Northwest, among others,” said van Rensburg.

The point is Legacy Exhibition – Working Life in South Africa: Gerard Sekoto & Lena Hugo is a must-not miss art feast.