CHRIS THURMAN: Eclectic Montagu is jewel in crown of Klein Karoo

Not long ago I was cruising the R62 in a baby blue Cadillac, the winter sun on my face, tracking the curves of the Kogmanskloofpas and admiring the huge chunks of sandstone rising either side of me.

The millions of years over which the river carved out the valley, the vast pressure bending the mountains into rocky swirls, all led to this moment. Did time stand still as we drove? Perhaps.

Sadly, the Cadillac (a rare 1956 Sedane De Ville) was not mine. It is one of two (the other is a 1964 model) belonging to the Montagu Country Hotel, the pride and joy of proprietor PJ Basson, my chauffeur and guide. Unlike me, PJ had places to be; he is a man on a mission, and that mission is to keep Montagu the jewel in the crown of the Klein Karoo. His mentor, Gert Lubbe, pioneered the Route 62 concept, which has been such a boon to tourism in this region, after purchasing a somewhat dilapidated Art Deco building — then called the Montagu Country Inn — in 1996.

The distinctive façade hasn’t changed too much since its construction in the 1930s, but its interior has been through numerous phases of restoration. Today the Montagu Country Hotel is a unique exemplar of Art Deco architecture and design. The rest of the town is an eclectic mix. A number of its houses and churches are more than 150 years old, and many of its prominent landmarks date to the early 20th century. These have been lovingly restored as museums, guest houses, restaurants and art galleries.

Indeed, it feels like there is art around every corner in town. My Montagu arts journey started in a room adjacent to the Montagu Country Hotel lobby, which Basson and his wife, Colene, have developed as an exhibition space for local artists. This can create intriguing juxtapositions. Currently, the gothic mood of Hanna Naudé’s oil paintings is pleasantly at odds with the happy hustle and bustle where hotel reception meets the stylish Feathers and Flatcaps cocktail lounge and the cosy charm of Charlestons restaurant.

Naudé takes the viewer into a troubling dream world, a storyland somewhere between Edgar Allen Poe and the windswept landscapes of the Brontë sisters. This made for a stark contrast with the sunny scenes through which I wandered as I headed towards my next stop: Kupenda Africa, where gallery owner Adele Faurie presents the work of artists from SA, Zimbabwe and Namibia.

I was especially struck by Blessing Chakandinakira’s watercolours, which range in style from the impressionistic to the sharply realistic. These quiet scenes from rural life are complemented by Stanley Sibanda’s exquisite oil painting Herding. Both are juxtaposed, in turn, with two untitled works by Petros Kaseke: bucks clash horns in a kaleidoscopic fever dream, and a photorealistic portrait of a woman is framed by two parrots, the mixed browns and pinks of her skin tone offset by their brightly coloured plumage.

I also had the opportunity to talk to Jan Raats, whose studio is full of winged creatures of a different kind: butterflies cut from plastic bottles, painted with acrylic and arranged into rows to form striking abstract compositions reminiscent of Kandinsky, Pollock or Chagall.

My final stop in Montagu was Long Street Gallery in the old KWV Building, home to a permanent exhibition of works by the town’s most famous contemporary artist, Willie Bester. Bicycle chains, gas masks, car doors — these are among the materials that Bester fuses in his sculptures and installations. The results are discomfiting, and insist that the viewer acknowledges the violence, greed and hypocrisy that have shaped SA’s history and continue to inform public life in this country. They do not make for easy encounters.

Bester is less well known as a drawer and painter, but climbing the gallery’s staircase (comprised of further soldered miscellany) reveals a series of portraits completed in 2022. These faces ask us to see Montagu not simply as a playground for well-heeled sojourners but instead as a place with all the contradictions and complications of life in a small SA town.