You know that creeping sense that the world is slowly sinking—literally and emotionally? Rising seas, climate dread, all of it—it’s hard to ignore. For Werner Bronkhorst, that looming reality doesn’t just weigh on him; it floods into his artwork, quite beautifully.

His latest series, Sail Away, showing now at Dellaposa, is soaked in layers of ocean-blue paint and feeling. The works are both vast and intimate. At first glance, all you see is texture—thick strokes, waves, ridges. But keep looking, and tiny human figures start to emerge, like memories half-remembered. A beach stroller. A lone surfer. “I pour layers of gel and wait,” Bronkhorst says. “Eventually, the landscape decides what it wants to be—then I add the figures.” Honestly, it feels more like discovering something than creating it.

“sail away” (2025), archival pigment print on heavyweight 395 gsm canvas, hand-stretched over fsc-certified, finger-jointed new zealand pine, and float framed in fsc-certified meranti with a painted white finish, 33 × 43 centimeters framed, edition of 69 — “Sail Away” (2025), archival pigment print on heavyweight 395 gsm canvas, hand-stretched over FSC-certified, finger-jointed New Zealand pine, and float framed in FSC-certified Meranti with a painted white finish, 33 × 43 centimeters framed, edition of 69

These aren’t sociable scenes. The people in them are barely there—isolated, almost pixelated, like faces in a video call that never quite loads. It’s that eerie digital loneliness, made visual. If you’ve ever felt like the only real person in a room full of screens, you’ll get it.

Bronkhorst grew up in Pretoria, South Africa, and now lives in Australia. His work has a sense of distance to it—geographically, emotionally, maybe even spiritually. You can follow his evolving, ocean-drenched worlds over on Instagram.