Kimathi Mafafo: Wandering in the Unknown World

29 April - 27 May 2023

  • Wandering in the Unknown World

    Kimathi Mafafo
  • Kimathi Mafafo (b. 1984) is a multidisciplinary artist whose practise ranges from embroidery and oil painting to installation. Mafafo obtained...
    Kimathi Mafafo (b. 1984) is a multidisciplinary artist whose practise ranges from embroidery and oil painting to installation. Mafafo obtained a National Diploma in Fine Arts from the College of Cape Town in 2007 and a National Diploma in Film and Video from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in 2016. Born in the semi-arid Kimberley in the Northern Cape of South Africa, Mafafo questions historical stereotypes around gender inequality in Africa. She primarily focuses on celebrating the black female and abstracted forms placing them in often verdant imaging, characterised by lush greenery and sensuous drapery that are far removed from the dusty mining town where she grew up. She has recently organized a group of Capetonian woman into an informal traditional embroidery society. 
     
    Solo exhibitions include (Upcoming) Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, UK (2024); (Upcoming) Wandering in the Unknown World, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Berlin, Germany (2023); Kgolagano – A Covenant, EBONY/ CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2022); Gestures from The Awakened Mind, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, UK (2021); Embolden, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2019); Solo Presentation, at Investec Cape Town Art Fair, EBONY/CURATED (2018); CITCC, Cape Town, South Africa (2018); Alone in Spring, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2017); Withdrawn, World Art, Cape Town, South Africa (2015).
     
     
     
     
  • Group exhibitions include (Upcoming) Talking Threads, Ode to the Maker: Embroidery Wereldmuseum, Rotterdam, Netherlands (2023); Art Dubai, with Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery,  Dubai, UAE (2023); Investec Cape Town Art Fair, EBONY/ CURATED, South Africa (2023); Also Known As Africa (AKKA), Paris, France (2022);  Diversity, Rupert Museum, Stellenbosh, South Africa (2022); Art Paris, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Paris (2022); Geleceg(n)iDokumak, CerModern Museum, Ankara, Turkey (2022); (IM)MATERIALITY, This Is Not A White Cube, Lisbon, Portugal (2022); This Is Not A White Cube, Lisbon, Portugal (2022); A Very Loop Street Summer, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2021); Everything was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt, FNB Art Joburg, Open City, Keyes Art Mile, Rosebank, Johannesburg, South Africa (2021); 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, EBONY/ CURATED, London, England (2021); Threads, The Duende Art Project, Monastery of the Zwartzusters, Antwerp, Belgium (2021); Presentation with This Is Not a White Cube Lisbon, Portugal (2021); Facing the Sun, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Schloss Goerne, Germany (2021); Knotted Ties, Lobby Gallery, Christie’s New York, United States of America (2021); 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair,(Virtual Representation) EBONY/ CURATED, London, England (2021); In (the) Loop, EBONY/ CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2021); Devils in The Details, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, United Kingdom (2020); FNB Art Joburg, Johannesburg, South Africa (2020); Intersect Chicago online edition of SOFA Expo, Chicago, United States of America (2020); 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, London, United Kingdom (2020); Feminist Utopia curated by Anelisa Mangcu, EBONY/ CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2020); LATITUDES Art Fair (Virtual Representation, EBONY/ CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2020); 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, New York, United States of America (2020);  Investec Cape Town Art Fair, EBONY/CURATED, Booth A12, South Africa (2020); Angel, St Antoine Church, in association with Muse Contemporary, Istanbul, Turkey (2019); Spotlight, LATITUDES Art Fair, EBONY/CURATED, Johannesburg, South Africa (2019); Botanica II, Curated by Adele van Heerden for Art B Gallery, Bellville, South Africa (2019); Textile, Curated By Amy Pike For Dyman Gallery, Stellenbosch, South Africa (2019); Filling in the Gaps, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa (2019); Connections, Greatmore Studios, Cape Town, South Africa (2019); Also Known As Africa (AKAA) 2018, Paris, France (2018);  Colourchart, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2017); A Painting Today, Stevenson, Cape Town, South Africa (2017); Summer Exhibition, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa (2016).
     
    Highlights and collections 
    Kimathi Mafafo has been awarded with the Finalist Ares Art Prize (2022) and the  Norval Foundation Sovereign Art Prize (2022). Kimathi Mafafo's work can be found in various international collections which include the Bunker Artspace Museum, Palm Beach, Florida, USA; William;Humphreys Art Gallery, Kimberly South Africa; Standard Bank Corporate Art Collection, Johannesburg, South Africa ; Africa First Collection, Israel; IZIKO South; African National Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa; The Art Bank of South Africa, Oliewenhuis Art Museum, Bloemfontein, South Africa; The Irma Stern Museum, The University Of Cape Town; Foundation H Museum, Antananarivo, Madagascar; KOKO Club, UK; Jiminez / Constantine Trust, Puerto Rico; Euston Capital Collection, USA; Serge Tiroche Collection; The House Of KOKO, London; Spiers Arts Trust, South Africa; Nelson Mandela Art Museum in Gqeberha (FKA Port Elizabeth); Rupert Museum, Stellenbosh, South Africa and the RO2 Art Collection (USA). 
  • Wandering in the Unknown World

    Wandering in the Unknown World

    Across a vivid series of textiles and paintings, a woman emerges from a garden-like setting filled with plants and flowers. Within this fluid, magical space, the human body and nature are intertwined; blooms pattern the woman’s skin while organic forms and luscious textures swirl around her. This new body of work by the South African Kimathi Mafafo was born out of what she describes as ‘a beautiful period of connectivity’, in which she found an escape from the chaos and anxieties of everyday life through her intuitive and collaborative approach to making art. Drawing on the philosophies of Romanticism that emerged in the 18th century, Mafafo’s solo exhibition at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery Berlin, titled Wandering in the unknown world, celebrates the strange, mystical powers of nature and art.

     

    For the past three years, Mafafo has been working with two women, whom she trained in embroidery and who come from different cultural backgrounds – one is Zimbabwean and the other is Xhosa [a South African ethnic group]. Though Mafafo designs the compositions for her textiles, based on her personal experiences, memories and emotional states, the three women create the works together, each contributing their individual styles of expression. ‘The same stitch done by another’s hand is different,’ explains Mafafo. ‘We have different bodies, techniques and rhythms.’ All of this, translated through the yarns, results in richly textured surfaces that speak of kinship, womanhood and cross-cultural connection. 

  • In many ways, the woman that appears in almost all of Mafafo’s works, albeit in different guises, is representative of the creative dialogue that happens in the studio as well as conduit for emotional and spiritual energies. In one work, she appears as a goddess-like figure in a rippling blue dress amid a swirling cosmos of colourful plants and patterns. Here, as in the other works, there is no definition to the space that surrounds her – she is untethered, floating, but it is a state that is associated with both joy and calm. She gazes up, directly at the viewer, with a composed and defiant expression while in the works titled Emerging into Self III and IV her eyes are closed as if lost in deep contemplation. The latter works, in particular, reflect on therapeutic and transformative effects of making and experiencing art – it can serve as a portal to another world, providing access to different ways of seeing and feeling. The twisted tendrils of rope that appear in many of the pieces and in which two colours are bound are lifelines as well as symbols of togetherness and protection.

     

    For this exhibition, Mafafo has also returned to painting, the medium in which she originally trained but moved away from in favour of textile work – ‘I’m pushing myself not to leave it behind,’ she says. Interestingly, the female figure in these works appears more youthful and almost girlish in her postures, perhaps in a nod to the freedom that comes with naivety, while the white flowers have a translucent, spectral quality, at times losing their shape and seemingly dissolving into her body. This fluid, harmonious relationship with nature is in keeping with the spirit of Romanticism but also to the many women artists, throughout history, who looked to the natural world for inspiration, healing and enlightenment. For Mafafo, ‘the unknown’ represents possibility and it is this – a joyous sense of expansiveness – that we feel most strongly in her work.

    • Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self I, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self I, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self II, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self II, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self III, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self III, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self IV, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self IV, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self V, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Emerging Into Self V, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, In line with Nature, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, In line with Nature, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Wandering in the Unknown World 1, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Wandering in the Unknown World 1, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Wandering in the Unknown World 2, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Wandering in the Unknown World 2, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, The Hands that Build, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, The Hands that Build, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Self Portrait 1, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Self Portrait 1, 2023
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    • Kimathi Mafafo, Self Portrait 2, 2023
      Kimathi Mafafo, Self Portrait 2, 2023
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