The great karoo is vast. stretching out over 400,000 square kilometers, the dry-as-bone desert sprawls supine, settled in much of South Africa’s Western Cape and nearly a third of the entire country. In the arid and never-ending swaths of continuous plains, flat-topped mesas, and stark mountain ranges, the “land of thirst” seems to be the furthest thing possible from recognizing and cultivating life.

But that’s not what Justine Mahoney saw on the long backseat drives from Cape Town to Johannesburg of her childhood. In the clouds, the cracked ground, the rugged ridges, she saw humanity, superimposing faces in her mind’s eye onto the severe landscapes. Decades later, the 55-year-old sculptor and painter’s latest offering, Pareidolia, a collection of oil-on-canvas paintings aptly named after the psychological phenomenon behind her childhood imaginings, explores the blurring of the boundaries we often place around identity, relationships, and being, on view through April 9th at Southern Guild Cape Town.

‍Pareidolia serves as a window into Mahoney’s manifesto on all living things. She presents amorphous, abstracted versions of the living form—layered through multiple applications of oil over several days—intertwined with one another in a position of mutual reciprocity and entanglement. They’re genderless, speciesless, yet wholly universal.

“I believe that all of us as a humanity, we have so many different parts within ourselves,” she tells me. “If we’re presenting in a kind of female form, we’re not necessarily feminine on the inside, or even humans. Sometimes we become more animal-like and relate to things within the environment. The boundaries between body and our environment blur.”

This softening, or obscuring of delineations of inter- and intrapersonal relationships, reflects Mahoney’s philosophy, one steeped in the works of Swiss analytical psychologist Carl Jung and post-humanist thinkers Rosi Braidotti and Donna Haraway. For Jung, this merging occurs within the rational and irrational, and for Braidotti and Haraway, humans and their environment work together to form a new future, combining to forge a framework centered on a sense of oneness and complexity.

“The question I ask is: ‘What is it to be human? What is it to be in relationship to each other, to the environment, and to beings other than humans?’” she says. “So there’s a thread of Eros that runs through all of my work. It’s not necessarily the masculine form of Eros, but more the feminine, relational form of Eros. It’s the thing that binds us all.”

Against a world defined by fracture, violence, and mounting antagonism, Pareidolia arrives as an insistence on connection. Mahoney’s figures emerge the way faces once emerged for her as a child: out of sparseness, out of severity, out of a landscape that might otherwise seem inhospitable to tenderness. The result is a body of work that asks what becomes possible when we look across the harshness of the present and choose, still, to recognize ourselves in one another.

“I feel that if we’re looking within ourselves to find the depths, our own depths, and we reach out to the other or the thing that we don’t understand,” she says. “If you can see beyond that, towards the humanity in everyone, seeing ourselves in the other, reflecting in the other, we can hopefully get past all of the things that divide us.”

Do you mind telling me a bit about the work, the inspiration, and how you got to making Pareidolia?

So I think it's a development from the last show that I had two years ago with Southern Guild. It was called Vigil, where I took myself through quite a deep, dream-like experience during the pandemic. That work explored different archetypes of strength to get through that very surreal and difficult time.

After that show, I read a lot of Jungian theory and did a lot of shadow work—working with my unconscious. I also started remembering childhood drives from Johannesburg to Cape Town through the Karoo, looking at clouds and seeing faces and forms in them. That idea came forward while I was experimenting with unconscious imagery and rough drawings.

Can you tell me a bit more about the Jungian work and philosophy you were looking into?

I see Jung’s work as essential. I think everyone should engage with it, especially his ideas about the shadow. Without that, I don’t think I would have made it through difficult times in my life.

His ideas about integrating the unconscious and conscious, and balancing masculine and feminine energies, really resonate—especially in today’s world. If people looked inward and worked with their shadow, they might not project conflict outward.

Did that Jungian thinking influence how you depicted these bodies and forms?

Very much so. I believe we all contain many different parts. Even if we present as female, we’re not necessarily feminine inside, and sometimes we even feel more animal-like. The boundaries between body and environment blur, and that’s what I’m trying to portray.

What role does intimacy play in Pareidolia?

I’m very interested in relationships—what it means to be human, to relate to each other, the environment, and non-human entities. There’s a thread of Eros running through my work—not a masculine version, but a more relational, nurturing one.

I often think about things like mycelium—the underground networks that connect plants. That’s the kind of connective, nurturing force I’m exploring. It’s about care and connection across everything, not just humans.

How did you land on the name Pareidolia?

I discovered it through a song by Morcheeba. I looked up the word and learned it means seeing recognizable forms in nature—like faces in clouds. It fit perfectly with my work, so I was very excited to find it.

Did contemporary world events influence this work?

World events are always filtering through us. The world feels quite chaotic right now. I think if we look inward and try to understand what we don’t recognize in others, we might move beyond divisions. Seeing ourselves reflected in others could help us move forward.

What is it like being a multi-disciplinary artist working across mediums like oil painting?

I usually begin with collage, pulling together images that don’t initially make sense. Then I draw from them and move into sculpture or painting.

I originally studied painting and sculpture but left painting for a long time. Recently I returned to it while working on this show and fell in love with it again. I use oil in a very fluid way, almost like watercolor, layering and letting the paint interact naturally. It’s a beautiful process.

What was it like working on multiple canvases at once, especially emotionally?

It was intense but wonderful. I lived in my studio for a month, surrounded by the paintings. I listened to music, danced, and worked in a very embodied, almost ritualistic way.

Moving between canvases helped—what I learned from one would inform another. Eventually, it felt like the paintings were painting me.

What interested you about the idea of bodies in flux?

We hold so much within us and don’t fit neatly into categories like masculine or feminine. I’ve been reading about posthuman thought, which imagines new ways of being beyond human-centered thinking.

It’s about seeing ourselves as part of the environment rather than separate from it. The boundaries between body, nature, and identity become fluid and interconnected.

Are there thinkers in posthumanism who influence you?

Yes—Rosi Braidotti and Donna Haraway. Haraway talks about moving beyond the Anthropocene into a more interconnected, imaginative way of relating to the world, rather than seeing ourselves as its custodians.

How did you decide to depict the sky and ground in such an emotional, figurative way?

I’ve always been fascinated by creation myths—how elements combine to form the world. I overlay my own emotional landscape onto that, creating a kind of personal mythology.

The sky and earth in my work represent emotional states, especially through mood and atmosphere.

Do you see that as personifying the environment?

Absolutely. That’s what mythology does—turning natural elements into living, meaningful forms.

Can you tell me about Sapientia and its role in your work?

Sapientia is the feminine form of wisdom. In Jungian thought, it’s about integrating rational and irrational, conscious and unconscious, masculine and feminine.

When those elements come together, that’s where true wisdom emerges.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I’m asking the question: What is it to be human? I hope to answer that one day.