‘Feels like home’ is an exhibition of paintings drawn from the personal photo archives of immigrants, refugees and other itinerants about leaving home and creating a new home. It is an ongoing series that explores themes of home, displacement, immigration and the effect of political policies that restrict movement.
Thomas Cartwright was born in Toronto and lives in Cape Town, South Africa, and shuttled between the two in his youth; he is, perhaps consequently, drawn to themes of displacement and resettlement. Both his ‘homes’ (Toronto Islands and Cape Town) are rich in natural beauty, and his work consistently explores the coming together of the natural world and the human-made, constructed one. He is drawn to beauty and he is drawn to meaning, and his work is an exploration of both.
Makhanda’s central business district is marked by High Street, which is quite wide. That street reminds me of the streets of Bulawayo, which is Zimbabwe’s second capital. In building Bulawayo, the early British settlers made wide roads to accommodate U-turns for their horse-drawn wagons. Nicknamed the City of Kings and Queens, Bulawayo was established as the nation’s industrial hub, and I lived there for two years.