YOLANDA MAZWANA

1996, Port Elizabeth, RSA

Yolanda Mazwana is a self-taught artist. Her work addresses themes around the female body, mental illness, phobias, popular culture, and relationships. The painter synthesises elements of abstract expressionism, neo-expressionism and symbolism.

Mazwana says, “I paint unusual formative characters to connect the dots about the questions around the female body, and what it goes through. I vent about the vulnerabilities of the mind, the emotions, the reproductive system and how our physical and physiological responses to trauma affect us. How our bodies respond to medications and the things that go misdiagnosed, The things that are going to be dismissed and forgotten, the things we have to protect ourselves from. The things we choose to keep hidden, to be healed and protected.

Nkgopoleng Moloi writes about Yolanda Mazwana’s artmaking that, “throughout her practice, Mazwana prioritizes a visual language that makes it possible to see oneself through the other —and to see the other through oneself. The figures she renders begin with the artist thinking about own her body. The genesis of I slowly shifts to become multiple Is. The figures are me. The figures are you. This is critical as it makes the work communal. This sense of commonality and co-mutuality reminds me yet again of Lorde for whom the erotic is deeply embedded with shared pursuits. She notes; “The erotic functions for me in several ways, and the first is in providing the power which comes from sharing deeply any pursuit with another person. The sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic, or intellectual, forms a bridge between the sharers which can be the basis for understanding much of what is not shared between them, and lessens the threat of their difference.” The kind of universality embodied in the figures in part emanates from the artist's vision to make works that are deeply resonant.

In her work, the body is depicted with nuance, excavating an archive of feelings of sensory embodiment. The work delves into the physicality of the human form, in particular, the woman’s body, while also reclaiming the body as a site of selfhood. Mazwana is attentive to how the body functions, how muscles contract and relax, and how the limbs fold and release. The figures are not merely representations of identity or desire but are studies in the physicality of the body. The arching of a back, the bending of a limb—these are not just visual artistic choices but are explorations of how the body functions and interacts with its environment.”

Mazwana notes; “The exhibition [What her body does, 2024] is a study in the body’s capabilities—the big emotions it holds, the subtle sensations it registers, the uncomfortable sensitivity, and the beautiful sensuality it embodies. The figures are unmistakably human, yet the emphasis is not on who they are but on what their bodies are doing—how they interact with the world around them and with their own internal experiences.”

In 2019 year Mazwana received The Bag Factory Young Woman Studio Bursary, Johannesburg, and in 2020, she was awarded the second prize for the Emerging Painting Invitational Prize, Harare, Zimbabwe. Her work has been shown at various public as well as private destinations in South Africa and Berlin, Germany. Mazwana had had many solo exhibitions in South Africa with the Kalashnikovv Gallery and others, participated in several residencies, received award nominations, and presented at a number of art fairs internationally.