Joni Brenner was born in Zimbabwe. She has a BA(FA) and a MA(FA) degree from the University of the Witwatersrand. She has been practising professionally as an artist since 1996 and has held solo exhibitions in Johannesburg and London. Her work is in several public and private collections. Joni’s primary work is in the field of portraiture. Her work has moved away from traditional notions of likeness in portraiture, and presents rather, in David Bunn’s words, ‘a visual quarrel’ with the tradition. In 2011 she and Karel Nel curated the exhibition Life of bone at the Origins Centre at Wits and co-edited, with Elizabeth Burroughs, the accompanying book. Her work in the SAFFCA collection is part of the series of works she produced for this exhibition.
Joni is a Principal Tutor in History of Art at the Wits School of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand. She was the recipient of the Vice-Chancellor’s Individual Teaching Award in 2008, and part of the Vice-Chancellor’s Team-Teaching award in 2014.
For more information, please see
www.jonibrenner.com/
http://wsoa.wits.ac.za/history-of-art/staff/joni-brenner/
