Catalogue 4 / 7

Foreward

Extract

Three Sightings

11

A Chance Occurrence

15

Extracts

25

Missing

33

Extracts

41

High Seas

53

Loomings

55

Extracts

61

Notebook

82

References

2009

Foreward

In 2009 a collection of writings, notes and photographs

was discovered in a suitcase on the platform of the
Woodstock Railway Station.
The suitcase was unclaimed and handed over
to the public library to be documented and archived.
Although the owner of the material has not been identified,
some of the writing is attributed to an A.H.
It is arranged here according to certain notes and references
made in the original material.

The storytelling that thrives for a long time in the milieu

of workthe rural, the maritime, and the urbanis itself
an artisan form of communication, as it were. It does not
aim to convey the pure essence of the thing, like information
or a report.
---The Storyteller: Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov
Walter Benjamin

Albert Pinkham Ryder

The Flying Dutchman
c. 1887

Albert Road, Woodstock

(Date unknown)

Three Sightings
A.H
[On arrival.]
Since I could remember, I had been moving between places. My
latest journey was no exception, and as I always I had departed
with no intention of return, knowing I would arrive where I had
never been. I took with me always the same set of objects, which I
carried in a small suitcase, because it was unassuming. A second
jacket, a second pair of trousers, the writing tablet, my notebooks,
a camera, the chess board.
Our arrival in the harbour had been a difficult one, the weather
was dirty and we were kept in the bay for some time for fear of
being smashed against the treacherous reefs that many a ship had
fallen victim to. It was the wintertime, we were surrounded by the
soft, cold smoke of fog, the sound of the horn, the diffuse, regular
beam of the lighthouse. After the others disembarked and headed
into the city, Id lingered in the vicinity of the docks, hoping to
hear something helpful. There was a particular quality to the kind
of information held by sailors and ships mechanics, those who
stay close to an edge of a special nature, neither entirely of the
ocean, nor entirely the city, a sacred kind of portal. These people
would witness the secret meetings of smugglers, the changing of
hands, the undeclared arrivals, the illicit departures. It was here
that I would learn more of the three sightings.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Three Sightings

Unknown Harbour
(Date unknown)

Lighthouse
(Photographer and date unknown)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Three Sightings

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Three Sightings

A Chance Occurrence

Everyone believed that the chess

players had met accidentally.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 A Chance Occurrence

11

In a riddle whos answer is chess,

what is the only word that
cannot be used?

Jorge Luis Borges

The Garden of Forking Paths

12

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 A Chance Occurrence

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 A Chance Occurrence

13

Extracts
(Supplied by the Sub-Sub Keeper of Records)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

15

Extract #1

Extract #2

The Haarlem

Sailing Adventures (1929)

In 1647 a Dutch East India company ship, The Haarlem, was driven
ashore in Table Bay. The surviving crew had commenced the
building of a fortification built primarily of wood recovered from
the wreckage. In the following months extensive salvage took place.
Substantial amounts of pepper, indigo, textile, sugar and porcelain,
some of which was damaged, were taken from the wreck.

The sailor (Irving Johnson) on deck during the night watch

[Standing at the figurehead, in calmer weather recounting the
details of the storm for his diary, later to become the voice-over
of an amateur film he has shot on his journey from Hamburg to
Cape Horn.]

Meanwhile, the heavy surf was progressively destroying the ship.

She was sailed entirely by human hands, no motors, no winches, no

switches, no lights, nothing but human hands to power this entire
vessel, to drive it 11000 miles where it doesnt want to go, the wrong
way around the Cape. We stayed in the bay until the storm of the
century came up, this storm wrecked 60 ships. This point was long
known as the greatest graveyard in the world of ships in years gone
by. The 3 ton anchor was caught by the wave and dashed back on
deck breaking the chains that held it and then we went up there to
secure this anchor on deck. We got pretty bashed up too and lots of
fellows had to be patched up by the captain who was an expert at
repairing seamen. Imagine the tonnage of the water to catch a 3-ton
anchor and throw it back on deck. Theres something about these
vessels that cause some kind of hypnotism, you do things youd
never dream of doing in your ordinary mind.

16

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

17

John Thomas Serres

Dutch Ships at anquor and British Squadron arriving Cape of Good Hope
1804
By courtesy of the Africana Museum, Johannesburg Lithographed by
Wright Printing, Johannesburg
18

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

19

Print of a ship at sea in stormy weather

(Artist and date unknown)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

21

Model ship hull

(Photographer and date unknown)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

23

Missing
A.H
[In the rented room, reading.]
I had borrowed it, the book, without his permission. It had travelled
with me for the duration of my journey along this unfamiliar coast.
It had confirmed what I had suspected, that the actual line of the
ocean began much further inland than it now appeared. Along
the way I had encountered many signs, clues to the places she
had passed through. They were always ciphers, never facts, never
evidence. I moved forward cautiously, without certainty, while each
step seemed to bring me closer to the possibility of an encounter.
The book recounted his many years on board, the crossing, the
storm. Hed said, providence had you find me here, landlocked,
too old to move or tell my story. Too drunk on whiskey, hed given
me the book. Even now, I was not sure of its fate, but I knew it was
somehow inextricable from my own.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Missing

25

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Missing

27

30

31

Extracts
(Supplied by the Sub-Sub Keeper of Records)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

33

Shipwreck near Cape Town

(Photographer and date unknown)
Card text reads: type of ship or date
(prefer shipwreck its on Cape Coast near Cape Town)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

35

Extract #3

Extract #4

From Moby Dick, or The White Whale, Herman Melville

Sailing Adventures (1929)

And, doubtless, my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of

the grand programme of Providence that was drawn up a long time
ago. It came as a sort of brief interlude and solo between more
extensive performances. I take it that this part of the bill must have
run something like this:

The sailor (Irving Johnson) below deck

Grand Contested Election for the presidency of the United States

Whaling voyage by one Ishmael
Bloody Battle in Afghanistan

36

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

[Writing in the first light hours of the morning, before the first call
to deck.]
We carry miles of wire and all kinds of repair equipment aboard
the ship, were not supposed to go into any harbour for any reason
whatsoever except the harbour destination for the cargo. These
vessels are self-sufficient for months on end with food, water,
supplies, repair equipment. Theres no way to dry anything except
by sleeping in your clothes onboard. This was nothing like the
books of I London I had read when I was preparing for the voyage
on land, they had a fight on every other page. I thought the books
were factual but theyre fiction.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

37

Model Ship
(Photographer and date unknown)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

39

High Seas
A.H
[A detour]
I was already sick of this place. I felt I was becoming surrounded
by strangers who behaved in a too familiar way towards me. I could
not seem to escape a suspicion that accompanied even the briefest
encounter. I had begun to isolate myself in the room, unable, even
afraid to leave. A kind of paranoia gripped me: what did they want,
were they concealing things from me, did they know who
I was, where I had come from, what I was looking for, were
they withholding information from me? Haunted by this sense of
distrust and uncertainty, I soon stopped sleeping, laying awake,
certain they would surprise me in the night to retrieve the book and
steal my years of research.
None of them were characters of any significance. They were
merely people who lived incidentally along a route I had inserted
myself into: a road along the beach where I knew she had passed.
I needed them for their knowledge of the everyday workings of
this place, the rhythms of its seasons, the patterns of the weather.
The truth is that the place was changing and they belonged to its
past, not its future. They seemed to sense this. Carpenters, traders,
seamstresses and fishermen, long established shop-owners, a
watchman on the steps of a meeting hall no longer in use.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

41

Closing the door firmly I would descend the staircase to the

street-level door, and walk the stretch of road, stopping to greet
them, mention how quiet the wind was, offer a cigarette, ask for a
light, and as subtly as possible insert a question into the conversation.
Few of them suspected I was more than an eccentric stranger,
probably a writer or journalist, at the least a lonely traveller just
passing through, polite and curious. But at night, when the wind
howled as if it were a torrent of water falling from the great height
of the mountain, I became terrified that behind the reserved smile
one of these strangers, was an inkling of my real purpose.

42

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

43

44

45

Previous Page:
Building plans for 1 Argyle Street, Woodstock, 1998.
Opposite:
Building plans for 1 Argyle Street, Woodstock (date unknown)
46

47

48

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

49

Cards
(Unknown origin)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 High Seas

51

Loomings
A young naval officer
[A letter, 3 months at sea]
Dear A.
Wed had the strangest experience on passing out of the harbour at
the Cape of Good Hope. Wed encountered a ship that seemed to
sail directly towards the shore, by-passing the entrance to the port
by a good 2 sea-miles to the left, so that it seemed to make straight
for the bay. One of the older sailors amongst the crew said it was
uncanny, like it knew of another shore, further inland. We were
carried out too far and too fast to make out what became of the
ghostly vessel.
Affectionately.

Untitled picture

52

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Loomings

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Loomings

53

Extracts
(Supplied by the Sub-Sub Keeper of Records)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

55

Extract #6

Extract #7

Personal

Message

Crew sought for older boat, iron hull badly rusted, and lightening
damage. Will require at least 2 months repair in dock. From then
will set sail for Brazil, the milk run. Experience preferred, but
amateur crew willing to work hard also welcomed.

56

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

[unknown provenance]
I dont know when or if this will reach you. The weather was
unkind to us off the coast of Indonesia. We were caught in the most
spectacular storm, several ships struck by lightening went down
around us. I am safe and have decided to stay put for a while. One
shouldnt push luck. Here is the next move: RD2.

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

57

Untitled newspaper fragment

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

59

Notebook (5)

Overleaf:
Pages 6279
Notebook with photographs
Beach Road, Woodstock, Cape Town
c1992 2009
Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

61

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Extracts

81

References
(Supplied by the Sub-Sub Keeper of Records)

1 Walter Benjamin, The Storyteller: Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov, in

Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn, New
York: Schocken, 1969, 90.
3 A lbert Pinkham Ryder, The Flying Dutchman c. 1887
Oil on canvas mounted on fiberboard
36.1 x 43.8 cm
National Museum of American Art, Washington

36 Moby Dick or, The White Whale. Herman Melville. Collier-Macmillan, London, NY:
1962.
37 Sailing Adventures (1929), Irving Johnson. Produced and Prepared by: Mystic
Seaport film Inc and video archives, USA. Posted by John Nankin on Facebook via
YouTube. No longer available online.
39 Model Ship (Photographer and date unknown) Elliot Collection (plates discarded by
Museum Africa, Johannesburg)

8 Available online: http://metagini.com/location/Canada/Dipper%20 Harbour/173841/

Pictures/

43  Available online: http://videogameaficionado.blogspot.com/2011/05/rockstars-lanoire-noir-ness.html

9 Lighthouse (Date and location unknown). Elliot Collection (plates discarded by

Museum Africa, Johannesburg)

4445 Building plans for 1 Argyle Street, Woodstock.

1112 Jorge Luis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths in Fictions (1944). Collected
Fictions: Jorge Luis Borges. Translated by A. Hurley. London: Penguin, 1998.

47 Building plans for 1 Argyle Street, Woodstock. From the Woodstock Synagogue
archive at the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies and Research, University of Cape
Town.

17 I rving Johnson, Sailing Adventures, (1929). Produced and Prepared by: Mystic
Seaport film Inc. and video archives, USA. Posted by John Nankin on Facebook via
You Tube. No longer available online.

4851 Cards found in the Woodstock Synagogue archive at the Kaplan Centre for Jewish
Studies and Research, University of Cape Town.

21 P rint of a ship at sea in stormy weather (Artist and date unknown) Elliot Collection
(plates discarded by Museum Africa, Johannesburg)
23 Model Ship Hull (Photographer and date unknown) Elliot Collection (plates
discarded by Museum Africa, Johannesburg)
2831 Excerpts of model ship plans for the HMS Aldeboran. Originally published
by Julio O. Gillen in Naval Modeling, 1963. Available online: http://www.
armada15001900.net/PLANOS.htm
35 Shipwreck near Cape Town (Photographer and date unknown) Elliot Collection
(plates discarded by Museum Africa, Johannesburg)

82

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 References

52 Available online: http://www.zmescience.com/other/science-abc/8-examples-ofphotometeors-w-pics/

59 T he Star Newspaper. Cover, 27 July, 2011
6279 Rene Holleman, Beach Rd, Woodstock, 2011.
77 From the Woodstock Synagogue archive at the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies
and Research, University of Cape Town.
81 Paymr. Lieut. Comdr. E.C. Talbot-Booth (Ed), Ships and the Sea, London: Sampson
Low 1938. (First published 1936)

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 References

83

Acknowledgments
Rene Holleman would like to thank Bettina Malcomess for
her contribution of the text, Anna Stielau for her photographic
assistance, Chris Davies, and my parents and family for their
continued support. Thanks also to Justin Rhodes and Ashleigh
McLean from WhatiftheWorld Gallery.
Bettina Malcomess would like to thank Rita Potenza and
John Nankin for sharing their archives.

84

Catalogue 4 /7 2009 Acknowledgments

85