Cape Town-based artist Wim Botha is originally from the suburban outer reaches of Pretoria. His work is rooted in the officious pretensions of his nation’s capital using government texts, dictionaries, and bibles to create sculptures based on popular iconography such as trophy mounts and religious icons. In most of these works, the carved text of the piece becomes the physical substance of the work, while the collective text informs the representation of the work as well as providing its social context.

The fourth and fifth photos down from the top are shots of Botha’s recent work, Fuse. which is currently part of a group show at Stevenson Gallery in Cape Town through January 14th, 2012. This piece is made of charred fire-resistant pine while all the other sculptures in this post are made of carved texts.

Photos courtesy Stevenson Gallery, Galerie Jette Rudolph, and mitue’s flickr.

via @turnergalleries