ART CITIES:London-Moshekwa Langa

Moshekwa Langa grew up in Bakenberg, a remote town in Limpopo, and left in 1989 to attend the Waldorf School near Pretoria. As a child he was particularly interested in visual expression, recording and documenting his daily experiences. Initially working in drawing and text, he later expanded into sculptures made with corrugated iron and cement bags, and began experimenting with various other media. He moved to Johannesburg where he worked as a contributing producer for the SABC, and in 1997 left to attend the prestigious Rijksakademie in the Netherlands.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Blain|Southern Archive

Moshekwa Langa’s solo exhibition “Relatives” at Blain|Southern in London focuses on his paintings and collages.  Langa’s work resonates with the register of capitalism. In recent years, the artist has been interested in the interrelation between homelands and cities as imagined through characters who leave family behind in search of livelihoods. The title of the exhibition refers to Langa’s choice to engage more readily with his work than with familial relationships, which are made more complex through geographic separation. The artist’s dislocation intensified as his career developed overseas and he struggled to connect disparate aspects of his life. It was symbolic that he wasn’t even able to point towards his homeland, which for years was absent from official maps of the fragmented sub-continent. A series of drawings was inspired by a rapidly developing neighborhood in Bakenberg, and incorporates raw materials found on construction sites. The drawings were produced through overlaying several materials on top of each other—an intense reworking of the paper with vaseline and turpentine that creates the visual effect of solidity. His collages comprise layers of newsprint and found imagery, often pixelated and distorted beyond recognition. Abstract patterns and figurative images are painted and drawn, then stretched and twisted by layers of adhesive tape and studio detritus. In his earlier paintings, the artist disfigured official maps in order to impose his personal mythology. He carries this aesthetic over into works on paper here, which explore rippling, subtle changes of tone. This emphasis on colur is significant in all of Langa’s work, which carries inseparable associations with race and nationhood, but also with the color theories of Waldorf education, also known as Steiner education, that emphasizes the role of imagination in learning, striving to integrate the intellectual, practical, and artistic development of pupils in a holistic manner.

Info: Blain|Southern, 4 Hanover Square, London, Duration: 25/7-15/9/18, Days & Houors: Mon-Fri 10:00-18:00, sat 10:00-17:00, www.blainsouthern.com