ART PROJECT: BRONZE ELEPHANT SCULPTURES
SEBAKWE & KHANYISA
TOKWE & KUMBURA
These 2 LIMITED EDITION bronze sculptures, in an edition of 51 each,
will be sold exclusively by Cafmeyer Gallery at a price of
8500€ per sculpture of which
1000€ will be donated to support the IZINDLOVU FUND for the benefit of
HERD, South Africa’s first elephant orphanage
At Izindlovu Fund we believe that Art and Nature go hand in hand because an artwork makes a statement about both nature and humanity’s relationship to nature.
Elephants play a key role in ecosystems, so their conservation has become more vital in recent years due to poaching rise and human-elephant conflict. At this moment, the African savanna elephant is threatened with extinction as they are now listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List.
ART IS AN ACTION TO DO SOMETHING:
we are very excited to share with you our first big ART PROJECT in collaboration with CAFMEYER GALLERY from Belgium to support elephant conservation in South-Africa.
The French artist François Vandenberghe – internationally known for his amazing and very realistic bronze sculptures of elephants – has created 2 new sculptures based on elephants from the Jabulani Herd in South Africa: Sebakwe & Khanyisa and Tokwe & Kumbura.
The artist is very enthusiastic about this new collaboration. As a man who always fought for the survival of elephants in the wild, this new project has his full support.
Therefore he has made a male and female bronze elephant to emphasize the continued existence of elephants all around the world.
HERD is South Africa’s first dedicated elephant orphanage, founded in April 2019 by Adine Roode.
The detrimental effects of the human-elephant conflict, including poaching, can be seen on the ground with the increased number of displaced or abandoned elephant orphans.
HERD strives to care for and rehabilitate orphaned elephants, to give them a new family and a second chance of life with the Jabulani Herd.
The bronze sculpture “Tokwe & Kumbura” by artist François Vandenberghe was created after the image of the two most female elephants, Tokwe & Kumbura in the Jabulani herd. Tokwe led the way for the original herd rescued from Zimbabwe. She is extremely kind, patient, accepting and nurturing, always leading by example and an excellent decision maker. Tokwe is a mother of two elephants herself and still welcomes orphans into her family. Kumbura is a lovely young female elephant with a genuine love for calves. As an orphan elephant herself, she has been successfully integrated in the Jabulani Herd and is now the youngest allomother in that unique herd. There is no doubt she will become a phenomenal mother or even a matriarch in the future as she has a natural empathy and instinct to protect.
The bronze sculpture “Sebakwe & Khanyisa” was created after the image of the dominant male elephant Sebakwe and the albino baby elephant Khanyisa in the Jabulani herd. Sebakwe is a confident and reliable elephant, who acts protectively and genuinely cares about every elephant in the herd. He commands respect and has a cheerful personality but he does have a softness for young elephant calves such as Khanyisa. Khanyisa is in the care of the orphanage since January 2020 after she was found with serious injuries from a poaching trap around her neck. Khanyisa has shown to be a true strength of character and has inspired many people along her recovery. Wild herds have been known to reject orphaned baby elephants. The unique structure of the Jabulani Herd, most of them orphaned elephants themselves, makes that orphan Khanyisa has been integrated successfully in her adoptive family. Sebakwe was one of the first male elephant she was introduced to back in 2020.
