WORDS Tracy Gielink
An enterprising group of KwaZulu-Natal crafters have pioneered the process of creating exquisite painting-like artworks from beads. Now their exhibition is showing at the Smithsonian in Washington DC, before embarking on a five-year global tour.
Amid the rolling hills of the picturesque KwaZulu-Natal Midlands, a quiet revolution has taken place. Ten mostly illiterate ladies have made the artistic world sit up and take notice as they have taken traditional Xhosa beading to giddy new heights.
Bev Gibson founded the self-funding Ubhule (Xhosa for beautiful) project in 2009, which was born of her passion for art and working with rural women. The enterprise started when she lived on a sugar cane farm on the KZN north coast where most of the cane cutters were Xhosa and their wives were unemployed. She utilised their traditional skills of ndwango – where glass beads are sewn on to clothing – instead using black fabric that was stretched like a canvas to produce a contemporary artwork.
When Bev moved to the Midlands, the ladies followed her and now, along with their families, live and work from the farm. The Ubuhle team consists of Bev’s partner, Ntombephi Ntobela, and 10 women beaders of which five have evolved to work as individual artists. “They have this incredible ability and the works come from their own souls,” explains Bev.
“Personally, I don’t want to grow beyond 10 beaders. We will happily train other people but I don’t want to get any bigger. We will train others so traditional talents don’t become lost – to show young people that even if you don’t have a matric, you can rely on traditional crafts,” she goes on.
Beautiful, intricate pieces are time consuming to create and a small piece measuring 35cm x 35cm takes a month to complete and sells for upwards of R15 000. Through their pieces, artists are able to celebrate, mourn, dream, pass social commentary and inspire. “I love the abstract work. Original beadwork was used to adorn skirts and we call it abstract but there is the influence of the symbols they have grown up with. There are incredible stories behind them,” she says. “Animals are always incredibly popular in this country – goats, sheep, cows and chickens. A gallery might commission six cow pieces but it is up to them what type of cattle, the shape, the size and how many.”
An exhibition of their work, Ndwango, is currently showing at the famous Smithsonian Museum in Washington, until September 2014, and thereafter is set to travel for five years. Bev concedes that the biggest challenge is going to be meeting the supply as international exposure and local commissions continue to increase.
What does the future hold for the entrepreneurial ladies? The hope is that by the end of the exhibition each of the five artists will have a gallery representing them and, closer to home, there are plans to build a shop and museum on the farm and to transfer ownership of some of the land to the ladies and build them homes.
083 794 4995, ubuhle.co.za