Elizabeth Rankin and Rolf Michael Schneider from Memory to Marble
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Elizabeth Rankin and Rolf Michael Schneider From Memory to Marble Aerial view of Voortrekker Monument in 1949: building site with ramps for transporting the completed marble panels into the Hall of Heroes (photo courtesy of Unisa Archives, Van Schaik album) Elizabeth Rankin and Rolf Michael Schneider From Memory to Marble The historical frieze of the Voortrekker Monument Part I: The Frieze ISBN 978-3-11-061522-7 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-066878-0 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-066904-6 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Library of Congress Control Number: 2019951916 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the internet at http://dnb.dnb.de © 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover image: Voortrekker Monument, Hall of Heroes, east section of south frieze (courtesy of VTM; photo Russell Scott) Typesetting: Satzstudio Borngräber, Dessau-Roßlau Printing and Binding: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com www.africanminds.org.za For Angela and Peter From Memory to Marble is an open access monograph in the true sense of the word. Both volumes of the digital version of the book are available in full and free of charge from the date of publication. This approach to publishing democratises access to the latest scholarly publications across the globe. At the same time, a book such as From Memory to Marble, with its unique and exquisite photo- graphs of the frieze as well as its wealth of reproduced archival materials, demands reception of a more tradi- tional kind, that is, on the printed page. For this reason, the book is likewise available in print as two separate volumes. The printed and digital books should not be seen as separate incarnations; each brings its own advantages, working together to extend the reach and utility of From Memory to Marble to a range of interested readers. François van Schalkwyk African Minds Contents Synopsis of Part II — ix Acknowledgements — xi Abbreviations of key archives, documents, names — xiii Part I: The Frieze Introduction — 5 1 Context — 17 A Great Trek? — 18 The Afrikaner cause — 26 The Monument committee — 40 Funding — 51 The site — 60 The centenary — 65 2 Concept — 79 Early ideas — 80 Van Wouw and Moerdyk — 90 Topics for the Great Trek — 118 The role of the architect — 140 Coetzer and the frieze — 154 3 Process — 177 The sculptors — 177 Harmony Hall — 188 Models and portraits — 217 The full-scale frieze — 228 The plaster casts — 247 The frieze in Italy — 258 Homecoming — 270 4 Image — 291 Composition — 291 The problem of form — 302 From plaster to marble — 330 The visual narrative — 352 Iconography and ideology — 389 viii Contents 5 Heritage — 395 An Afrikaner monument — 396 Destroyed or redefined? — 405 Re-branding the Monument — 421 Representations and rejoinders — 431 Epilogue — 462 Illustrations Part I — 465 Bibliography of works consulted — 477 Index of people Part I — 499 Index of places Part I — 505 Synopsis of Part II: The Scenes 1 Departure from the Cape (1835–37) 2 Presentation of the Bible to Jacobus Uys (April 1837) 3 Trichardt at Soutpansberg (summer 1836 to autumn 1837) 4 Trichardt in Delagoa Bay (April 1838) 5 The Battle of Vegkop (October 1836) 6 Inauguration of Retief as governor (6 and 11 June 1837) 7 The Battle of Kapain (28–30 November 1837) 8 Negotiation with Moroka (October/November 1836) 9 Report from Retief at Blydevooruitsig (11 November 1837) 10 Debora Retief records her father’s birthday (12 November 1837) 11 Descent from the Drakensberg (late 1837) 12 The Treaty with Dingane (4 or 6 February 1838) 13 Murder of Retief and his men (6 February 1838) 14 Massacre of women and children at Bloukrans (16/17 February 1838) 15 Teresa Viglione warns camps around Bloukrans (17 February 1838) 16 Dirkie Uys defends his father (11 April 1838) 17 Marthinus Oosthuizen gallops through Zulu lines (17 February 1838) 18 Women spur men on (after 17 February 1838) 19 Arrival of Andries Pretorius (22 November 1838) 20 The Vow (9 December) 21 The Battle of Blood River (16 December 1838) 22 Building the Church of the Vow (1840–43) 23 Women at Saailaer (1838?) 24 Mpande proclaimed king of the Zulu (10 February 1840) 25 Death of Dingane (February 1840) 26 Return from Natal over the Drakensberg (after 1843) 27 Sand River Convention (17 January 1852) Acknowledgements To undertake the complex research required to investigate the history and making of the Voortrek- ker Monument frieze, and the events and memories of the nineteenth century that underpinned it, would not have been possible without the help of numerous individuals, too many to name here. Our sincere thanks for individual assistance is recorded in our footnotes at the relevant places, and here we hope only to record our gratitude to those whose assistance was exceptional and ongoing. Of paramount importance has been the support of the staff of the Voortrekker Monument and the Heritage Foundation, particularly Managing Director Cecilia Kruger and VTM Museum curator Etta Judson, who have been with us from the very beginning, sharing their remarkable know- ledge and giving us access to material and the Monument itself; archivists Riette Zaaiman (now at the University of Johannesburg) and Zabeth Botha, who has tirelessly tracked down our needs; researcher Estelle Pretorius; librarian Malene Schulze; educationist Christo Rabie; and recently Riana Mulder, Petra Luus, Annie Antonites, Charlotte Drotsky, Geraldine Paulsen, Lizette Jansen and yet others. We could not have written this book without them. In our research we have read the memories of Voortrekkers from which their history was shaped, but also tapped the memories of living witnesses of the Voortrekker Monument programme. Werner Kirchhoff in Johannesburg recounted his boyhood experiences of the making of the frieze and gave access to the material and photographs related to the work of his father, Peter Kirchhoff, assembled by himself and his wife Anna-Maria. Martso Strydom in Centurion Park shared her recollections of modelling for the frieze, and the late Danie de Jager in Meyerton vividly recalled his own and his stepfather’s work as a builder at the Monument and in the installation of the frieze. The Romanelli family, the sculptor Raffaello and his sister Rubina Romanelli, welcomed us to their studio in Florence where the frieze had been carved, and later to the family home. In Florence we also enjoyed contact with Rossella Campana and Paolo de Anna who have undertaken research on sculpture studios there and in South Africa. Family of Gerard Moerdyk were also helpful, especially Dorette and Gerhard Vermeulen in Pretoria, and Elke Vermeulen in New Zealand. Another key source for us has been archives, libraries, collections and heritage sites the length and breadth of South Africa. Our thanks go in particular to, in Bloemfontein, the staff at the Archive for Contemporary Affairs, University of the Free State (ARCA), especially Ernene Verster who has continued to assist even after her retirement; in Johannesburg, initially Linda Chernis and then Diana Wall at Museum Africa; in Pietermaritzburg, Elrica Henning who generously assisted us at the uMsunduzi Museum and the Voortrekker Complex and shared with us her own research, as well as Peter Nel at the Archives Repository and Elize de Villiers and Dirk van Velden of the Dutch Reformed Church of Natal (NG Kerk Natal): Synodal Archives; in the Cape, Ronel Rogers at the National Library, and Zmelanie Ismail, Susanne Noll, Lidia Swart and the staff at the Special Col- lections of the University of Cape Town and Stellenbosch libraries; Quarta Pretorius at the Vegkop Heritage Site, and the staff at the uMgungundlovu Heritage Park, the Blood River Heritage Site and the Ncome Museum. The list of grateful acknowledgements for Pretoria is particularly long: Gerrit Wagener at the National Archives and Records Services of South Africa (NARRSA); Trevor Moses at the National Film Archive; Nandor Sarkady at the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk in Afrika Argief (Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa Archive; NHKA) Marie Cotzee, Annette le Roux and Ammi Ryke at Unisa; Gerard de Kamper and Chris de Klerk at the University of Pretoria Collec- tions and Archives; the staff at Ditsong National Museum of Cultural History, notably Linda Raath and Malene Schulze (later at the VTM Library) and recently Jaco Schoonraad; and Dirk Oegema of City of Tshwane Museum Services. In addition, beyond South Africa, we were fortunate to receive assistance from the University of California Library, Berkeley; the Getty Center Library, Los Angeles; the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich; the National Archives of the United Kingdom at Kew; and the National Archives at The Hague: we thank all their patient librarians and archivists, xii Acknowledgements particularly Neil Corbett and Rene Janssen at the latter two archives respectively. Nor should we forget the librarians at our own universities who have good-naturedly and efficiently tracked down obscure requests. Many have been generous in sharing their personal knowledge on an individual basis at various stages of our research, and we thank particularly Kristine Bøggild Johannsen, Judith Callmeyer, Clive Chandler, Nicholas Clarke, Nico Coetzee, Whitney Davis, Alex Duffey, Jane Fejfer, Jeanette Ferreira, Roger Fisher, Federico Freschi, Beate Fricke, Jan Bart Gewald, Jorrit Kelder, Sandra Klopper, John Laband, Henrike Lange, Bill Lindley, William Martinson, Samantha Masters, John Parman, Ulrich Pfisterer, Astrid Schwenke, Jeffrey Spier, Alta Steenkamp, Isa Steynberg, Carrie Weston, and for his extraordinary assistance in translating difficult early Afrikaans texts, the late Ryk Hattingh, and more recently Zirk van den Berg. We are most grateful too to the artists who agreed to interviews and allowed us to reproduce their works, and also to institutions, collections and photographers who gave reproduction permission.