Heatwave (2026) – hand-pulled screen print by Jessica Bosworth Smith

Jessica Bosworth Smith (b.1989) works primarily as a figurative painter, while also exploring ceramics and interventions with found objects. Her work scrutinises – through a kaleidoscopic lens – idealised versions of reality, worlds that speak of the ultra-rich and the hyperreal, of hyper-manicured online personas. But these spaces are delightfully disrupted, her work inspired by “the Saturnalian impulse to imagine the most jarring and absurd things that could disrupt the veneer”, as demonstrated through her use of off-kilter perspectives, unruly compositions, vivid colour, dizzying pattern and mesmerising detail. Scenes are populated by peculiar and mismatched subjects: Tigers, birds of paradise, crocodiles and snakes mingle with domestic cats and the young-and-the-beautiful, the viewer an accidental voyeur who has stumbled onto the spectacle. In these unexpected and playful details, where familiar meets fantastical, the viewer is invited into layered dialogues with the artist’s imagination – and with their own; to reconsider what they’re seeing – and how they’re seeing it.

Bosworth Smith has held three solo shows, exhibited in major art fairs and group exhibitions across South Africa, participated in residencies in Brazil and Finland, and published two books through Imagnary House. She was also named one of the Design Indaba Emerging Creatives of 2017, and listed in ABSA l’Atelier’s Top 100 in 2017 and 2018.

• 7-Colour screen print on archival 100% cotton paper (250gsm BFK Rives)
• Paper size: 76×56 cm
• Limited edition of 30
• Numbered and signed by the artist
• Hand-printed in Cape Town
• Prints are sold unframed