Deziree was born in 1983 in the Industrial town of Vereeniging, Gauteng, South Africa. Pursuing her art career from an early age, she attended extra art classes in the evenings after school. Persistence paid off when she, along with six other youngsters, won a national art competition. The winners were awarded an extensive tour through the Eastern Cape, where they attended various art workshops. It was in this beautiful part of South Africa where the inspiration to capture the African soul on canvas was born. This passion for the Dark Continent even survived the impressions of the Masters made when she toured Europe, with her art class in 1999.

Her family moved to Fish Hoek in Cape Town, the art capital of South Africa. Juggling between being a full-time art student, and painting murals and portraits to pay for her studies, she was awarded a scholarship for her second year at Cape College, where she graduated. Whilst working for the infamous interior decorator, Ralph Krall, she did a course in interior design, creating the platform needed to launch her art career.

After numerous visits abroad to paint private collections, Deziree’s paintings live on in England, Holland, Spain, France, Germany, the Bahamas, and the USA. Ultimately, her goal remains to paint and exhibit her own creation.

WORKS

Inspired by the mystery and luminous beauty of the African woman, her first genre was created. With semi-realism and vivid colours, her style is distinctive. Dark skin, tribal costumes, and ominous eyes all beat down on canvas capturing the rhythm of Africa. Deziree’s “African Women” seduce the walls of famous luxury hotels in Hermanus, Franschhoek, and the Kruger National Park in South Africa.

With immense concern, Deziree fights with passion to raise awareness for the Rhino's plight and that of other endangered animals. Motivated by this cause, her recent work “From the Ashes” mirrors the mood of this endless battle between civilization and the natural world. Bright and crisp colours clashing with more subtle shades illustrate celestial maps, whimsical animals, tribal myths, and ancient aircraft, worlds apart yet ever entwined. The dominant presence of the mortal element represents humanity, custodian of the world.

Deziree is presently living her dream, painting full-time in her studio in Fish Hoek, Cape Town.

Larry is an internationally recognized African Wildlife artist who was born in Zimbabwe in 1963.

He grew up on a farm in the northeast of the country. His early interest in painting continued while studying for an agricultural degree in Australia and later while working as a white water rafting guide on the Zambezi River.

In 1988 he began a professional painting career and since then he has exhibited around the world including several exhibitions in New York, London, Austria, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. 

He specializes in oils, watercolor, charcoal, and pencil paintings of Wildlife art and African landscape especially Victoria Falls, where he resides. He travels extensively on field trips all over the world to gather material for future paintings.

WORKS

The artist is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and has undertaken a number of his own expeditions in pursuit of material for his paintings. Larry is deeply involved in various fundraising for charity including his current drive to raise money for Hwange National Park. 

His artworks are displayed in museums worldwide and have been featured in many books. 

Larry has a passion for nature, and it shows throughout his paintings with the attention to detail that is given. He enjoys spending time in the wilderness and is constantly looking for new subjects to paint. 

As Simon Combe’s understudy, we truly believe that he now carries the torch of the best realist artist in the world

Peter Gray is a multi-award-winning artist. 

He was born in Zimbabwe in 1950 and sold his first artwork as a young boy at the age of 12 years old. Living near the Hwange National Park and a stone’s throw from the Matobo Hills National Park, Peter grew up with a passion for these wilderness areas that became the nurturing ground for his career as an artist.

Peter was educated at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art. In 1973 he moved to London, England, where he set up his home and studio. For a decade, he operated a fine-art business that traded in the UK, USA, and Zimbabwe out of London until he relocated to Zimbabwe to establish studios, a workshop, foundry, and gallery producing and selling bronze and silver sculptures, paintings, commissioned jewelry and objet d’art. 

WORKS

Today, Peter lives in Cape Town, South Africa with his family and works from his studio in the Silvermine Nature Reserve. His exceptional artworks feature among collections of art enthusiasts, museums, galleries, corporations, and nature lovers worldwide. 

Peter’s inspiration stems from all sorts of situations. Peter states, “I find myself constantly looking for it in everything – the way someone is sitting, the way a tree has grown and is bent over from the wind, the power in the forearms or hindquarters of an animal in motion. It is whatever impacts on me at the time – its volume and weight, the way the light strikes the subject or bizarre situation. All of a sudden, I am drawn into this thing because of the energy that it is projecting at the time. It’s the energy that inspires and motivates me in my attempt to capture it on canvas or through a sculpture.”

Joubert was born in South Africa in 1948 and passed away in 2013. He was the younger brother of wildlife filmmaker and conservationist, Dereck Joubert.

He loved spending time in the bush so much, that he abandoned city life altogether and moved into the Selati Game Reserve, where he worked from his studio located there.

Believing that possessions complicated his life, he settled for his four-wheel-drive vehicle, tent, and camp bed. Joubert loved spending time in the bush, where he could constantly study his subject matter. Such passion is visibly seen throughout his paintings.

Joubert was the first impressionistic artist in the wildlife art subject. As such, he will continue to gain more fame for creating the then-new style of work. Today, there is a few artists re-creating and re-inventing their own concept of impressionist wildlife art. 

WORKS

There is something gentle, yet powerful in his artworks, that one never tires of seeing. Joubert’s art truly brings a sense of peace to the viewer, while at the same time telling a story that can be interpreted and defined by the viewer. 

There are very few paintings of his left in the market, as most are already owned by private collectors. The shortage is of course caused by many people wishing to hold on to their paintings and wait for Joubert’s arts to appreciate, or to keep them as well for the joy they bring to their homes and everyday lives. His artwork is light and beautiful to look at with something new to see every time you steal a glance.

Born in 1950, and brought up on a farm in Tanzania, Mike Ghaui has spent his life painting and sculpting the rich diversity of wildlife to be found in East Africa. Ghaui’s work has a striking vitality and he brings an authenticity to African Wildlife Art that only a long-time love of Africa can.

Ghaui currently resides in Kenya. He is a great painter, and exceptional at creating sculptures of African wildlife. He is known for having done a 12 ft tall at the shoulder, life-size elephant sculpture that once stood in Gloucestershire, England. It is his career-defining piece that is known as The Great Ruaha Tusker, which is actually now kept on a private ranch here in Texas. Mike would one day like to see the Artist’s Copy of this sculpture placed in a big city, where it would raise awareness of the plight of this magnificent species.

His art is exhibited worldwide, and he is a very well recognized artist in the industry. 
As an artist, Mike is impressively versatile. His paintings are oil on linen canvases, ranging from loose, sepia sketches to more detailed finished works, whilst his sculptures are modeled in various mixtures of clay, they are cast in bronze and sterling silver at Pangolin Editions Foundry in Gloucestershire. The best foundry in England. 

Among his greatest influences as an artist, he acknowledges Terence Cuneo, Wilhelm Kuhnert, Rembrandt Bugatti, and, in the early days, David Shepherd. 

He is well known in galleries in New York and New Mexico here in the US but has had exhibitions worldwide dedicated to his arts alone. He is by far, one of the greatest living wildlife artists that are seen in Africa today.

WORKS

David Kuijers was born in 1962 near Johannesburg, South Africa to Dutch Immigrant parents. He completed his schooling at the Pretoria School of Art, Music & Ballet, with a distinction in graphic art and the best painter award for 1980. He did 2 years of military service at Youngfield in Wynberg, Cape Town. A brief period as a signwriter was followed by enrollment to study Graphic Design (majoring in illustration) at the Cape Technikon. He received the merit award as a top student upon graduating. For 10 years David freelanced as a designer/illustrator to aid his efforts at becoming a full-time artist, which he achieved in 1999.

Notable commissions include Woolworths, The President Hotel, The Radison, Medi-clinics (Constantiaberg & Cape Town), Langeberg Foods, and Dole.

He is married to the artist Dina Kuijers and they have 3 children, two of whom are also artists and the third who opted for a real job.