Sethembile MSEZANE

(South Africa)

Sethembile Msezane is currently working towards a Masters in Fine Art at UCT, where she interrogates issues of identity through the mind of a nineties born millennial South African black woman whose world is shaped by her background in the ‘New South Africa’. She re-imagines various mythological and historical characters such as Chapungu- The Day Rhodes Fell (2015). During this project she maps out how popular culture informs constructions of history and mythmaking, and ultimately addresses the absence of the (black) female body in the monumentalisation of public spaces.

Recently, Msezane was awarded the Sasol New Signatures Merit Award (2015). She was selected as a Barclays L’Atelier competition finalist (2015). Msezane was invited by the Open Stoep Residency at the AVA gallery as well as Vrystaat  Kunstefees Festival to perform her piece Love In The Time of Afrophobia (2015). As part of Infecting the City 2015 she performed Ellipsis and FR!KA. In 2014 Msezane was acknowledged as Art South Africa’s Bright Young Thing for her Public Holiday Series. She was a participant at OPENLab2014 – a residency in Bloemfontein and Richmond.

Selected group shows include Translations at Emergent Art Space and Reed college, Portland, Oregon (2015), Anywhere the Wind Blows at Brundyn+ (2014), Camouflage at Circa, JHB (2013), Greatest Hits 2012, If the Halls could Talk at Association of Visual Arts (AVA) in Cape Town (2013).