The History of The Gallery
The Centurion Art Association came into existence in 1967 when a group of artists decided to take the initiative to form an Art Society and hold group exhibitions. At that time no such initiative existed in the greater Verwoerdburg Municipal area (now Centurion). They approached the municipality to provide them with gallery/exhibition space, but they refused. The artists then got a sponsorship to use the Lougardia Building in Hendrik Verwoerd street and successfully held exhibitions there. After many discussions the municipality gave them space above the Checkers Centre in Cantonments Road and eventually built the Centurion Art Gallery that became the home of many artists to exhibit their work. At the end of 2022, Tshwane decided to close the gallery because they could not afford to pay salaries anymore. Due to the close relationship and long history and annual exhibitions by the Centurion Art Association (CAA) they granted us permission to manage the gallery and keep it open for exhibitions.
Tessa de Wet
Founder & CEO
A largely self-taught artist, born in August 1968 in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa. She is a versatile artist doing both painting and glass work (hot glass and stained glass), which she loves equally. She likes incorporating both brush work and palette knife techniques in the painting process with subjects ranging from structures to portraits incorporating various styles ranging from total abstraction, contemporary, surrealist and realistic art. She prefers painting with oils due to its malleability, although the drying time can be both a hinderance and an advantage and she also works in acrylics and charcoal.
Tessa is an equally left and right brain dominant driven individual. She has been part of the Art Association Pretoria and Centurion Art Association (CAA) for many years and was the chairman of the CAA from 2020-2023 and started Spektra Art Gallery in 2023.
Tessa has a vast array of styles – always trying to conquer the unconquerable – She has no definite style or preference of one. In her art journey she has received training from artists Alain Nortje (who introduced her to all things art), Leon Fourie (realism by copying old masters such as Vermeer – Girl with a Pearl Earring and Jacques Louis David – Napoleon crossing the Alps), contemporary artist Ruth Walter and recently with renowned international artist Johan Conradie from AD-Reflex. She has a preference for the paintings of artists Tomaas, Johan Conradie, Johan Kok, Helena Hugo, Tiens Palmer, Alex Kanevsky, Christian Hook, Valery Koslyakov, Salvador Dali, Renoir, Rembrand, Pissaro, Vermeer, Manet and Monet to name a few.
Tessa was blessed by the Lord to have survived a near fatal heart attack at the end of 2022. She lives to paint and serve Him for yet another day.
Lee Hutton
Founder & Manager
Lee was born in Kempton Park in 1984 and raised in a small town in the Northern Cape where she finished school. She went on to study Fine and Applied Arts at the Tshwane University of Technology, majoring in glass design, sculpture and printmaking. Finishing off strong with a BTech Cum Laude and the winner of Eskom's Energy Efficiency Lighting Design competition student category in 2010. She went on to pursue her dream of becoming an architect through studying at the University of Johannesburg. She finished her BArch degree and received a merit award for Critical Thinking in 2018. Lee acquired her professional registration as a senior architectural technologist in 2023.
Lee had the privilege to study under the great minds of Jan van der Merwe, Ian Redelinghuys, Renette Kruger, Amira Osman, Eric Wright and Alex Opper. Who all played huge roles in her development as an individual. She finds the worldmaking of Jackson Hlungwani and Helen Martins inspirational and she admires the art of Leonardo Da Vinci and M.C. Escher. She has a keen interest in Outsider art.
With a passion to make the world a better place, Lee grabbed on to the opportunity presented by Spektra Art Gallery. She believes that there is healing power in the process involved in creating art and that art is a medium that has the capability to bring people and communities together.
Naomi Foster
Curator
Naomi Rona Foster, born 3 May 1973 in Pretoria, is a self-taught artist with a love for detail and beauty. Although she always wanted to do art, the realities of life with three boys and a learning disability, had her working as a florist and seamstress. However, a year before covid in 2019, she managed to start focussing more diligently on her art. After joining the CAA, she regularly attended art workshops and engaged with other artists on a weekly basis, enabling her progress on her art journey and she is now successfully making progress from an amateur to a professional artist.
She loves expressing and creating herself through relief art – a mixture of sculpture and painting (flowers, figures, landscapes), because of the involvement of the artist in the creative process. Apart from acrylic as painting medium, she also uses charcoal and oil pastels to paint landscapes and portraits, of which she has done several commissions. In September 2022, she received a merit award with a landscape painting at the annual CAA competition exhibition.
South African artists Gertie Roeloffze and Dirk van der Merwe had a marked influence in her development as an artist, although she has her own individual style of painting. On her bucket list is her wish to travel internationally if the opportunity arises.