Biography
Jana Hamman (born 3 September 1982) is a designer/artist working in various media, but with her practice presently focussed in digital/mixed media and installation. She obtained her BA Information Design from the University of Pretoria in 2005, since which time she has worked in various Nields within the South African creative industry, including design, fashion and art. She is one half of the branding and concept studio Jana + Koos.
For Jana, art is the personal outlet and diversion of the seriousness of day-to-day life. It’s the escapist driven opportunity to play, challenge, experiment and poke fun at. She creates, not so much for art’s sake as for the purpose of personal amusement and curiosity, the result of which is work that just so happens to similarly entertain and amuse a growing audience and following. She wants to make herself smile, do a double take, blush, gasp…the repercussions just happen to be that others do too.
Although she avoids creating pieces with any particular social commentary in mind, Jana’s work uses humour, irony and satire to engage critically with societal norms, playing with the austerity of tradition and culture.
She is also frequently involved in collaborative projects, believing that the sum of creative parts inevitably leads to a greater whole.
As part of the creative duo, Groenewald-Hamman, (the art leg of the agency Jana+Koos) Jana exhibited in 2014 at the Bowery in New York City, USA. The show was entitled “City of Golddiggers. JHB Hates You”, and was comprised of digital prints, mixed media works, and an installation of 1000 gold teeth hanging like rain from the gallery ceiling. Groenewald-Hamman also exhibited a solo show in 2011 at the Room gallery in Johannesburg, as well as a part of a group show “Can’t Fool me Now’, in Berlin.
In her personal capacity she has exhibited as part of a group show at the M Contemporary in Sydney in 2014, in a group painting show at No End contemporary art space in Johannesburg, and as part of the Levi’s initiated ‘Con.Artist’ workshop and exhibition in 2015, as well as having exhibited among other South African artists, photographers and illustrators at the Bright Night Project in Johannesburg (2015). In 2016 she launched her “GIRLS!GIRLS!GIRLS! exhibition with Kalashnikovv Gallery, which was very well received, reNlected in both the press and sales of work.
