A DOCTORATE FOR A TRADITIONAL NDEBELE ARTIST.

By Nii B. Andrews

It was during the landmark Magiciens de la Terre exhibition held in Paris at the Center Pompidou in 1989 that the work of Esther Mahlangu first came to the attention of an international audience.

Since then her art has been exhibited extensively in Asia, Europe and the Americas.

Mahlangu has been credited with extending the reach of traditional Ndebele art by adding acrylic paints to the natural pigment range of white, ochre, black, yellow and white clay.

She explained, “The acrylic is durable in the rainy season. It was adopted by the younger generation of painters like myself.”

This allowed for a harmonious blending of tradition with modernity thus enabling the much easier propagation of an important cultural heritage.

Her paintings are executed without using preliminary preparatory drawings. She utilizes an ultra fine chicken feather to apply the paint and pigments.

The compositions are virtuoso pieces that transcend graphic design, geometric abstraction and pop art while also referencing Ndebele beadwork.

Mahlangu now a venerable octogenarian, will receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Johannesburg for “her legacy as a cultural entrepreneur, skillfully negotiating local and global worlds, and as an educator,” said the executive dean of the UJ Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Prof Federico Freschi.

She was taught the Ndebele mural painting and beadwork by her mother and grandmother.

Mahlangu has been painting for over 70 years.

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