Athi-Patra Ruga
Athi-Patra Ruga
“Escape to the End of History” (from the Exile Series)
2015
Born 1984 in Umtata
Based in Cape Town
There is a moment of grace when questions are asked within a space, in spite of the prejudices that are present. All of our education, all of our experience, the travel, the reading and we are shown up by people who don’t have all that, but who show you grace. They engage with your work very directly. That’s when the art is made, in that moment of grace. I always want to hold on to it. When I make tapestry, I insert my performative self into these arcadian landscapes, these utopian dreams.
- Athi-Patra Ruga, CCQ magazine, 2015
Cinga Samson
Cinga Samson
2 x Untitled artworks
c. 2011/2012
Born 1986 in Cape Town
Based in Cape Town
I am more interested in starting a different conversation on representation than the ones that already exist. I also want to represent the spirituality of where I am from, while leaving the politics of representation for the audience to interpret.
- Cinga Samson, Ocula, 2020
Buhlebezwe Siwani
Buhlebezwe Siwani
“Uthengisa unokrwece elunxwemene I”
2015
Still from performance, photograph by George Tebogo Mahashe
Born 1987 in Johannesburg
Based between Cape Town and Amsterdam
When I began my work – and it hasn't changed – it was under the umbrella of spirituality. What African spirituality really means and how it speaks to colonisation, history, socio-economic conditions, tradition, the black female body. And how all of that takes effect in the present world where we have manifested ourselves as human beings. I just started thinking about the things we construct and the things that have been constructed for us and the ways in which the black female body is through ubungoma.
- Buhlebezwe Siwani, Nataal Media
Ayana V Jackson
Ayana V Jackson
“Grand Matron”, “Electa”, and “Esther” (from the Leapfrog (a bit of the other) Grand Matron Army Series)
2010
Born 1977 in New Jersey
Based between New York, Paris, and Johannesburg
In Leapfrog (a bit of the other) Grand Matron Army, multiple generations of women - from the pre-colonial to the afropolitan - are presented in tandem. By doing so we are reminded of complexity, legacy, and three-dimensionality. However, in the process of deconstructing these varied subjectivities, I am also motivated to interrogate how the woman’s body (specifically the non-white woman’s body) is eroticized / exoticised. To go further, as it relates to the black female body specifically, I question the myriad “caricatures” assigned to her during colonial and postcolonial times.
- Ayana V Jackson, 2010
Billie Zangewa
Billie Zangewa
“Winter in Hall Road”
2008
Born 1973 Blantyre, Malawi
Based in Johannesburg
When I started doing my work, people, I think, didn’t understand the social issues that I was dealing with because it was very subtle. It was really rough. I get to Joburg and they say it’s just decorative and she’s just a craftswoman. When I got to America, they understood it was about breaking the myth of black lives. We are just like everyone else.
- Billie Zangewa, Culture Type, 2020
Terry Kurgan
Terry Kurgan
“Hotel Yeoville” Suite
2008-2011
Yeoville (Johannesburg) has always been a foothold for new migrants to the city and it now hosts micro-communities from countries like Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Somalia, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and other parts of the African continent. Isolated and excluded from the formal economy and mainstream South African society, their dominant engagement is with each other and with home in faraway places. In this inhospitable public domain, Hotel Yeoville explored the capacity of ‘acts of intimate exposure’ to enable people to make human connections with others.
- Terry Kurgan
More information about the project here
Dale Yudelman
Dale Yudelman
“Rachel”, “Jonathan” and “Edward” (from the I am Series)
2007-2008
This series pursues a more personal account of the individuals who apply for work on public notice boards. These community-advertising spaces are found in busy convenience stores and supermarkets across South Africa, where they seldom receive a second glance from most consumers.
- Dale Yudelman
Many of the ‘applicants’ are from Malawi or Zimbabwe; each note bears its own temperament from the wording to the character of the handwriting and once placed in the foreground of our immediate and unhurried experience, the petitions become a personal passage to the emotions of the writer seeing employment.
- Dale Yudelman
Of the 200, 300 people gathered, only about 20 to 30 end up making it onto the bus that will take them to the Home Affairs offices in Barrack Street, where they are issued temporary permits.
- Dale Yudelman, Artthrob, 2008
I am series video: https://www.daleyudelman.com/new-page-1
Galia Gluckman
Galia Gluckman
“Loco”
2017
Born 1973 inTel Aviv, Israel
Based in Cape Town
I enjoy the process of cutting and pasting. It is almost like meditation. Each strip of paper, however seemingly insignificant, becomes significant.
- Galia Gluckman, Visi, 2014
Willie Bester
Willie Bester
3 x Untitled artworks
2002-2003
Born 1956 in Montagu
Based in Cape Town
People have built up a resistance to anything that addresses the psyche of mankind or people or themselves. I believe that we must protest against that which is wrong. There is no form of escape; remaining apolitical is a luxury that South Africans simply cannot afford.
- Willie Bester, The Journalist, 2014
Thandiwe Msebenzi (male figure in frame)
Thandiwe Msebenzi (male figure in frame)
3 x Untitled photographs (from the OoBhuthi abatsha series)
2014
Born 1991 in Cape Town
Based in Cape Town
Much of my work has been about me trying to understand masculinity, me seeing myself in masculinity, me being the observer of masculinity, me being affected by masculinity. Oobhuti abatsha or amakrwala refers to new men.
These are men who are recent initiates, who have come back from the mountain or initiation school. This series of photographs documents the specific attire worn by Xhosa new men, as a symbol of their recently achieved manhood. The clothing also acts as part of a performance of their manhood, as it marks their transformation from boys to men in the eyes of their communities...The project interrogates how we appropriate, shape, give meaning to things and make them our own.
- Thandiwe Msebenzi
The space in which I worked in definitely echoes a colonial past, but my work very much exists in the present. The structures are buildings from UCT, a learning institute and also a contested space in terms of its origins: the land once belonged to the Khoi of the Cape. The spaces don’t stand alone but are occupied by men who do not just stand, but also take ownership of the space. We sadly have a history of slavery, colonialism and oppression in this country. I was very much aware of this history in the making of the work. The University in the past was also not previously accessible to the Black man. The work echoes the past but remains in the present where the black man takes ownership and is not a victim of European imperialism.
- Thandiwe Msebenzi, Between 10and5
I began the project with an interest in the attire of the new men (ooButhi abatsha), how it had changed over time and what it had been influenced by. As I progressed with the project I started to look at the woman’s role in initiation. I realized how for me as a Xhosa woman initiation was something both personal and removed. Yes, it is taboo to be working with initiation as a woman as it is a territory known to be exclusively for men. However the culture does not entirely exclude women. There are events that women take part in during the initiation process and when the men come back. Women stand in their own right as very important figures in initiation.
- Thandiwe Msebenzi, Between 10and5
Igshaan Adams
Igshaan Adams
“Al Wadood”
2016
Born 1982 in Cape Town
Based in Cape Town
I started out considering the influences my domestic environment had on my identity: my upbringing; the internal conflict about my spirituality, race and sexuality; and the dynamics within my family. Now my work is more abstract. I remain engaged with the relationship between the sacred and the profane. Overriding themes are still centred around self, but from a mystical point of view. I’m often inspired by the materials themselves and how they can be used to express emotions.
- Igshaan Adams, Visi, 2018
Tamlin Blake
Tamlin Blake
“Wallpaper – Tapestry”
2010
Born 1974 in Johannesburg
Based in Riebeek West
I am interested in working, visually and conceptually, with how stories weave themselves around us, influencing what we do and how we think. Without us being aware, the news,gossip and other peoples’ successes and tragedies form the background fabric of our everyday lives. These stories filter through to us, affect our thinking and form the backbone of our society.
Tapestry itself is traditionally a form of storytelling. Like the newspaper they are printed on, these used and discarded tales have been reinvented and recycled, woven back and forth in an intricate pattern to form images, which then in turn create a new contemporary narrative.
- Tamlin Blake, Spier blog, 2012
Andrew Putter
Andrew Putter
“Secretly I Will Love You More”
2007
Born 1965 in Cape Town
Based in Cape Town
My work is obliquely - but heavily - indebted to the writings of two philosophers: Walter Benjamin and Gilles Deleuze. Benjamin intensified my interest in history - especially counter-histories based on seemingly insignificant, marginal material. And Deleuze taught me so many things, most especially that joy is a far more rigorous concept than I once supposed.
- Andrew Putter, Artthrob, 2008
David Nthubu Koloane
David Nthubu Koloane
“Flight I” and “Flight II”
2017
Born 1938 in Johannesburg
Died 2019 in Johannesburg
Apartheid was a politics of space more than anything…and much of the apartheid legislation was denying people the right to move. It’s all about space; restricting space…Claiming art is also reclaiming space.
- David Koloane, Interview with Ivor Powell, 1995
John Murray
John Murray
“The Pink Link”
2004
Born 1973
Based in Cape Town
I think once I’m busy with and inside a painting my physical approach to painting portraits or abstracts is very similar. Like my abstracts I often paint or wash over the portraits and start again with what is left on the canvas. I think as an artist your subjective environment is influenced by your physical environment. Difference is integral to South Africa and of course it creates vibrancy, but also tension and I do think this has a subliminal influence on my work.
- John Murray, Between 10and5, 2015
Restone Maambo
Restone Maambo
“The Bond”
2016
Born 1980 in Lusaka, Zambia
Maambo's paintings recall intimate moments from his childhood in Zambia and travels in South Africa in his later years. The painterly compositions, laden with subtle layers of colour, speak to notions of home, human connection and are reflective of the meditative state in which the artist works.
Jürgen Schadenberg
Jürgen Schadenberg
“Sophiatown 1955 - We Won't Move”
1955
This photograph captures a moment of defiance in history when the apartheid government was determined to demolish Sophiatown, a multi-cultural hub in Johannesburg. The people stood united in protest saying: 'We won't move'.