Dear Gabi,

I am not very happy with you.

On 13 February 2014, I went to pick up Bouquet III from the Goodman Gallery in Parkwood, Johannesburg. I was thrilled. Of all the things I had lost or had had to give up, the triptych had been what I longed for the most. Things. Except art is always more than a thing. I was getting used to living in a house whose main passage no longer had another one of your triptychs, Ek is ‘n Kimberley Coloured.i I was no longer pausing to inhale its rich deep reds, allowing myself to be stretched in my own skin as a Blackwoman from this place. I had made my peace with its absence. But it is only once Bouquet III is up in my favourite part of my house that I allow it to feel like home. When I moved to a new house I lived in too briefly, I felt the same way. Even now, several years later, in a new city, I stare at the triptych, mesmerised as I drink my morning coffee, and also when I am just too lazy to move off the couch to drive, write or cook.

I stumbled into your Faces of War installation, and I was ready to be provoked, taught and enchanted. I was in too good a mood to expect simple engagement. Quite frankly, your art had spoiled me. As I walked about that Valentine's Day eve at the Goodman Gallery, very pleased with myself, I saw my face reflected on the glass frames of the various digitally manipulated faces below which I read: ‘Faces of people who may or may not be victims or perpetrators of domestic violence’. The combination of monochrome photographs, the light and glass created a mirror effect. You knew this would happen. Each audience member would be trying to spot cues about whether the digitally manipulated face was that of a perpetrator or victim.