Gregoire Boonzaier Art

Gregoire Boonzaier was a South African artist well known for his landscapes, portraits and still life paintings. He was a famous exponent of Cape Impressionism, a founder of the New Group and a contributor through his artworks, to the struggle against apartheid. He was the fifth child of political cartoonist Daniël Cornelis Boonzaier and Maria Elizabeth Boonzaier. Early on, Gregoire made acquaintance with the artists, Pieter Wenning, Nita Spilhaus, Moses Kottler and Anton van Wouw, all of whom were close family friends. It was Moses Kottler who first gave Gregoire a box of paints in 1922 and Nita Spilhaus an easel in 1926, igniting a creative flame that was to burn for more than 80 years. Gregoire's father was dead set against a formal training in art and felt that he had more to learn from the artists around him. In 1923, his first two oil paintings were shown at Ashbey's Gallery in Cape Town. His first one-man exhibition followed two years later. He held more than 100 one-man exhibitions during his painting career. After an acrimonious confrontation with his father in 1932, Gregoire moved into his studio in Cape Town. Following a successful exhibition, he visited England in 1934, where he studied together with Terence McCaw and Freida Lock at the Heatherley School of Fine Art under Bernard Adams. Gregoire also trained in graphic art techniques at the Central School of Art and Design in London. His early paintings having been strongly influenced by Pieter Wenning, he now absorbed the work of Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne, Maurice Utrillo and Georges Braque and made trips as far afield as Russia, where his socialist learnings were reinforced. Gregoire returned three years later to help find the New Group, with Terence McCaw, Freida Lock, Lippy Lipshitz and Cecil Higgs. He served as its first chairman for ten years. The New Group served as a forum and a mouthpiece of young South African art for almost 15 years, staging exhibitions throughout the country and providing rural areas with a glimpse of the new trends in art. Gregoire served for six years on the Board of the South African National Gallery in Cape Town. Gregoire made Cape Town his base and his subsequent work reflected views of District Six and Bo-Kaap, recording its colorful life. He settled in Onrusrivier, a short distance outside Hermanus. He had been introduced to Onrus shortly after World War II by Uys Krige. Uys’s family had holidayed there for many years. Gregoire took part with 43 South African artists, in the "Exhibition of South African Art," at the Tate Gallery in London in 1948.

(Biography provided by Robert Azensky Fine Art)