Animal art in South Africa: “Pigcasso” freely paints the snout

In Franschhoek, South Africa, “Pigcasso” creates enthusiasm: she paints – with brushes and paint. The sow’s talent for painting was discovered by her owner by accident. Now the pictures can soon be seen in Germany.

Abstract art: the pig “Pigcasso” taps his nose on a color palette and signs the pictures that he has previously painted with brushes. The paintings are colorful, they show circles, strokes, lines and blots. “It’s funny when people come into the barn to see Pigcasso. There’s usually two reactions: ‘Wow, it’s huge!’ And: ‘Oh, the art is actually really good,’ says Joanne Lefson, who works with the pig.People really have to pinch themselves: “They ask themselves: Can it be good if it drew a pig?”

The fact is: the pictures are sold. You pay the equivalent of a good 100 euros for a print – or you sometimes pay 2000 euros for an original, acrylic on canvas. Lefson uses it to finance her sanctuary in Franschhoek, which she founded for farm animals. She has already given a new home to some animals from farms. Two piglets were among the first residents, they had wrested them from a pig fattening farm. To keep them from getting bored, she gave them some balls and some paintbrushes too.

“The one piglet now known as ‘Pigcasso’ was interested in the brushes. It ruined everything else but loved the brushes. I saw that and thought, ‘Maybe there’s something I can do with it, says Lefson. “If I cut out the brushes and set up a canvas, maybe she’ll paint.”

Up to an hour a day

It wasn’t long before “Pigcasso” took the brushes in his mouth and let them fly across the canvas. That is still the case today. Lefson dips the brushes in paint, which of course she chooses. She places them – head down – in containers so that the artsy pig with the mouth just needs to grab the handle and get going.

Lefson speaks of a kind of collaboration: “‘Pigcasso does all the work with the brush. I work in the background, move the paint pots, sometimes turn the picture if it needs more color in one place. But it’s her who produces abstract, expressionist art.”

The sow gets started early in the morning and paints for between 30 and 60 minutes. There are always interruptions, because in between she grabs a piece of apple, for example. It’s important for Lefson to use her artist pig to show how smart and individual animals you see on farms are.

Exhibition in Germany

Pigcasso will be six years old in May. Joanne doesn’t know how long the sow can continue painting: “You don’t normally see a pig that’s six years old. In the pig fattening facility, they are slaughtered after six months.” The stately sow, who would probably weigh between 500 and 600 kilograms, is “abnormal”, says Lefson: “We have to be careful what we feed her. When she gets older, the day could come when she is no longer can stand up. She’s genetically engineered to grow.”

No wonder, then, that Pigcasso needs an artistic creative phase after the morning activity. And without a doubt, one can speak of an artistic career in Pigcasso’s activity: Pigcasso’s works have already made it into galleries. In the summer there is even an exhibition in Germany: from the end of June to the beginning of September, pictures are on display in Hann. Münden to be seen. Exhibitions are also planned in Great Britain and New York. In addition, a British publisher wants to publish a book about the brush-loving pig in the coming year.