WORDS Palesa Mohola PHOTOS Lea Crafford and Nanje Nowack/Courtesy of Southern Guild

As the recipient of Southern Guild’s international residency programme in Cape Town, the GUILD Residency, Simphiwe Buthelezi will present her solo exhibition at the gallery.

Born in Johannesburg, Simphiwe is a sculptor and installation artist whose rise in the art scene began in 2018, when she was awarded the Blessing Ngobeni Art Prize, which led to a residency at The Bag Factory Artist Studios in Johannesburg. Her work has been exhibited around the world, with her wider exhibition history including presentations in Kinshasa, DRC, and Miami, USA.

Her work is rooted in material exploration, cultural continuity, African spirituality and processes of self-discovery. She works with natural materials, including ‘icansi‘ (traditional hand-woven reed mats), glass beads, ‘tankrali‘ (Zulu seed beads), sea sand, seashells and metal. To retain their agency and sculptural integrity, she avoids bright paint, opting instead for natural, earthy tones and letting the materials lead her work.

“My work is always in dialogue with the sacredness of the reed mat,” Simphiwe says. “It fascinates me how a single object can unravel and transform into many forms – just like the people to whom it belongs: boundless, adaptable, enduring.”

She uses a creative process closely related to a practice called ‘ukubuyela e masisweni‘ – or ‘returning to the source’ – an existential and spiritual undertaking through which intergenerational materials become vessels for cultural memory, ancestral knowledge and new forms of meaning.

The new body of work for Kala, whose isiZulu translation is ‘weigh it’ or ‘measure it’, includes the work Mhlaba, the focal form for the exhibition’s central themes. It is a monumental sphere whose surface is layered with tactile constellations built from cut segments of ‘icansi‘, traditional mats hand-woven from ‘iNcema‘ bulrushes – a material that extends beyond its everyday function, as the mats are not only used in domestic contexts but are also used in ceremonies and rituals across South Africa. The artwork appears neither complete nor intact, looking as if suspended in a state between formation and erosion.

Another work, Abacus, is an extensive wall-hung installation made from ebonised, handmade clay beads that shift across a series of open contour lines. Released from the confines of the abacus’s conventional four-sided boundary, the instrument becomes mutable and porous, exposed to forces of motion, time, deduction and addition – transforming an ancient tool of calculation into a distorted meditation on what cannot be counted.

“Ultimately, Kala asks not how we measure the world, but what we choose to measure. It invites an alternative currency of value; one rooted in attention, care, and the belief that making remains a vital way of processing the conditions of the present,” says Simphiwe.

Kala will be on show at the GUILD Residency, Silo 5, V&A Waterfront, Cape Town, from 18 September to 12 November 2026. | southernguild.com

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WORDS Palesa Mohola PHOTOS Supplied

The Sasol New Signatures Visual Arts Competition continues to be an instrument for launching the careers of many South African visual artists, offering them an opportunity to showcase their talents and gain significant recognition and exposure within the art world. This year, 938 works were submitted at eight collection points across South Africa, of which 123 were selected to advance to the final round of judging and to appear in the 2026 exhibition at the Pretoria Art Museum.

“Sasol New Signatures has provided a vital platform for emerging artists to share their perspectives, challenge convention and take the next step in their creative journeys. We continue to support the arts because we believe that creativity plays an important role in shaping society, encouraging new ways of thinking, inspiring dialogue and helping us better understand the world and one another,” says Nozipho Mlambo, Sasol Senior Manager: Group Brand and Sponsorships.

This September, Sphumelele Zondi, a Johannesburg-based visual artist who works primarily with sculpture and mixed media and holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts from the University of KwaZulu-Natal and a Postgraduate Diploma in Fine Art from the Durban University of Technology, came out victorious. Entering for the first time, she was announced as the 2026 Sasol New Signatures Visual Arts Competition overall winner for her mixed-media piece, The laundry of a nation.

“The work draws attention to clothing that carry these experiences, traces of labour, care, hardship, and survival that can become embedded within them. I was also interested in the idea of Abantu bazothini?, the awareness of being watched, judged, or questioned by others, and how this can influence young people from an early age. Through the work, I want viewers to reflect on what they have inherited from generations and circumstances before them, and to question what they are now carrying forward,” says Sphumelele.

Sive Ntombana, a painter and mural artist based in Makhanda currently completing a Master of Fine Arts at Rhodes University, is this year’s runner-up with his work titled Umlandeli.

“This work is informed by a philosophical approach. From this approach, I use Sihle Sogaula’s and Hugo Canham’s thinking of the Black Xhosa home as a space full of theoretical activity. Within the work, I am trying to make sense of the notion of trauma and healing through a reflexive narrative perspective that is informed by theoretical thinking,” says Sive.

Sasol has been a sponsor of the competition for the past 36 years and continues to provide emerging South African artists with a platform to express their unique perspectives and push the boundaries of creative expression.

2026 Sasol New Signatures Visual Arts Competition Winners

• Overall winner Sphumelele Zondi walks away with a cash prize of R100 000 and an opportunity to hold a solo exhibition at the Pretoria Art Museum in 2026.
• Runner-up Sive Ntombana takes home R25 000.

The five Merit Award winners receive R10 000 each, and they are:

• Charlie de Bruto – Pretoria, Ball buster, 2026 (Mixed media)
• Inga Lokwe – Pretoria, Qula kwedini, 2025 (Glass, metal, wood)
• Wisani Manyisi – Johannesburg, Dance of memory, 2026 (Mixed media on paper)
• Thomas Masingi – Polokwane, The desire to become one series, 2025 (Digital photography on true ivory)
• Charné Mungur – Gqeberha, Echoes of silence, 2025 (Steel)

The Sasol New Signatures exhibition, featuring the work of the 2026 winners and finalists, will take place at the Pretoria Art Museum from 10 September to 8 November 2026. | sasolsignatures.co.za

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WORDS Neyani Mphephu PHOTOS Supplied (Zani Alberts), Shaun Wagne, Inge Prins (Ashleigh Lloyd), Georgia Dorward, Supplied (Karlien van Rooyen), Supplied (Sinegugu Ngxongo), Francis Marais (Mpho Vackier), Supplied, Inge Prins (Thabisa Mjo), Supplied, (Naledi Modupi), Suly Khan (Bonolo Chepape), Supplied (Keabetswe Seema), Sune van Tonder (Tanisha Neill)

South African women have always been problem-solvers – within homes, communities and cultures. That same ingenuity drives established and emerging designers and artists whose work is rooted in lived experience, heritage and emotional depth. The result is work that speaks from a specific place, earning them recognition at home and abroad.

Here, 10 South African creatives reflect on the ideas, experiences and beliefs behind their practices.

Zani Alberts

Co-founder of DEFT Studios in Gqeberha, Zani is a furniture designer and maker who came to the craft through architecture. She and her business partner, Martin Tallie, established the studio in 2020. Her distinction lies in closing the distance between designer and maker. “There’s a real proudness that comes with being part of the physical fabrication of furniture,” she says. “Not a lot of women are willing to engage in that physical realm of production. For me, design doesn’t happen at arm’s length – it happens on the workshop floor, while it’s being built.”

She believes South African design already meets international standards, and that smaller, more considered workshops frequently produce exceptional work. “Design has become more playful, more expressive, more willing to experiment, and that’s the part I’m most excited to see grow,” she says. “The next generation seems less interested in permission. What I’d really like to see alongside that is more local production. Please stop importing. We have the skill and we have the makers, so the pieces may as well be built here.” | deftstudios.co.za

Ashleigh Lloyd

Founder of Studio Lloyd in Cape Town, Ashleigh creates handcrafted, large-scale sculptural lighting she describes as “future heirlooms”. Being a first-generation South African has shaped her conviction that local design can stand confidently on an international stage. Her move into bronze reflects an instinct for permanence – objects that carry the marks of making and grow into their own histories. She sees a generation moving beyond trends towards work that is “highly individual, technically ambitious and made to last”, and wants South African design recognised “not because it is ‘South African’, but because it is simply exceptional”. | studiolloyd.com

Karlien van Rooyen

Karlien’s ceramic practice emerged from hardship: homelessness, gender-based violence and chronic illness. Each vessel she makes stands as what she calls “a determined and dignified declaration of our personal and collective ability to endure”. Trained in medical science and shaped by years of environmental activism, she sees South African design’s future defined by “uncompromising depth, textural integrity, and grounded social innovation”, with rural materialities elevated globally “not as exotica, but as authoritative voices”. | karlienvanrooyen.com

Sinegugu Ngxongo

Founder of Bambizulu, Sinegugu grew up watching women solve problems for their families and communities. “If something solves a particular problem while also bringing beauty into the solution, for me, that is a tick,” she says. Working with rural artisans in Hlabisa, she speaks of design’s “limitless possibilities” and the responsibility they carry. “I would love to see a future where technology and innovation don’t replace that human knowledge, but help us strengthen it.” | bambizulu.com

Mpho Vackier

Mpho founded TheUrbanative, a furniture and product design studio in Johannesburg, in 2016. She approaches design through cultural interpretation. “It has never been about reproducing those references literally, but about understanding them, interpreting them and allowing them to exist within a contemporary design language,” she says. She sees a shift away from the need to “explain or prove its Africanness”, and is excited by African narratives joining the wider contemporary design canon rather than being viewed merely as inspiration. | theurbanative.com

Thabisa Mjo

Founder and creative director of Mash.T Design Studio in Johannesburg, Thabisa stumbled into design in 2015 when she entered the Nando’s Hot Young Designer Talent Search and won with her Tutu 2.0 pendant light, inspired by Xibelani skirts worn by Xitsonga women. She describes South African women as “collaborative, enterprising, and problem-solving” – qualities she sees as directly transferable to design. “The aesthetic is a result of an approach, a perspective,” she says. “The most interesting design and designers are those with a perspective, and I think that’s what the next generation of really stand-out design will be defined by.” | mashtdesignstudio.com

Naledi Modupi

A Johannesburg-based visual artist and illustrator, Naledi is best known for semi-abstract portraiture that celebrates the beauty and individuality of Black women. Her distinctive style pairs continuous lines with bold, vibrant colour, moving between digital and traditional media. Naledi uses colour as her primary language, telling stories about women with vivid, expressive palettes that feel gentle and confident at once. “I don’t see gentleness and boldness as opposites; I think they can exist beautifully together,” she says. She is energised by the way South African women are asserting their place in the conversation, and excited by the breakdown of boundaries between art, illustration and design. “I’m seeing more and more women coming through, creating their own visual language and making their mark.” | naledimodupi.co.za

Bonolo Chepape

Founder of the textile and lifestyle brand Lulasclan, Bonolo treats pattern as a storytelling tool. Her work has appeared on Nando’s restaurant facades, in Mr Price Home collections, and in the rain | VISI collection, which launched in August. “At the core of my practice is an ongoing exploration of mark-making and pattern as a language that connects people, disciplines, and places,” she says. “I find my tribe in women who choose to remain joyful and full of colour despite sometimes serious working environments.” That generosity of spirit shapes her design thinking too: “My thinking always leans on creating space for women to embrace every part of themselves, their strength, softness, ambition, joy and individuality.” She sees the future of South African design as many voices at once. “It is about allowing many perspectives to exist simultaneously and, through that diversity, creating something distinctly our own.” | lulasclan.com

Keabetswe Seema

Keabetswe works across collage, photography, sound, mixed media, printmaking and installation. She sits at the juncture of Afro-surrealism, Afro-futurism and Black feminist thought, constructing layered visual worlds that collapse archival, personal and imagined narratives. Raised in a matriarchal household, she foregrounds Black women to restore their agency. “They take centre stage time and time again in order to preserve and shift the dominant narratives that have marginalised them previously,” she says. She is excited by immersive world-building: “less items simply on the wall but active embodied engagements from the audience with the art and/or design.” | @_keaseema

Tanisha Neill

A furniture designer, Tanisha grew up surrounded by South Africa’s diverse landscapes and credits her mother’s instinct for interiors as a formative influence. She entered the industry at a moment of growth, with platforms like Cape Town Furniture Week and Design Week South Africa opening new doors for emerging designers. “The more designers look inward, understand their own perspective and build from there, the more distinctive and exciting South African design will become,” she says. Her advice: “Don’t wait until you have the perfect brand, the perfect plan or all the answers.” | nish.design

What connects these 10 women is a shared instinct to look inward before looking outward. Each studio, each practice, each piece is a statement about where South African design has come from and, more importantly, where it is capable of going.

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The post Rooted in Place appeared first on Visi.

WORDS Amy Rusch PHOTOS Jan Ras

Choosing these objects was easier than I’d imagined. They are belongings; I belong to them, and they belong to me. We inhabit the same living and making space. Each is a porthole of access to family, to memory, and to a sense of awe in relation to the living world. Many of the pieces were made, held, worn or formed long before my birth; in many ways, they have added to how I’m able to be who I am. They are valued beyond measure.

Bezoar Stone

Two days aft er my paternal grandmother Sunray passed away, my dad and I went to visit her sister, who said to choose anything from her home, saying she no longer needed “things”. I was immediately drawn to this round stone – which, once I held it, I realised was not a stone at all. Smooth and much lighter, it’s a bezoar stone – a hairball from the stomach of a goat from the family farm. Historically, bezoar stones are thought to have healing properties. A bezoar could be worn as a charm, ground into powder and consumed, or dropped into a drink that’s suspected to contain poison. They can be found in the stomachs of goats, oxen, snakes and porcupines. I feel incredibly grateful to be the custodian of this magical, mystical ball.

Bird-call Instrument

Just before my god-daughter Kino was born, my dad spent several days making and perfecting two little instruments made of wood harvested from a searsia tree growing in the garden. The correct amount of friction and rosin [pine sap resin] makes the wood call out like a bird. One instrument was given to Erin and Nic as a gift for the soon-to-be-born Kino – and in an uncomplicated moment when my dad walked me to my car that same afternoon, he handed me the second instrument. I was very moved.

Ancestral Threads

Receiving the first cotton threads on wooden bobbins from Nouchi, my maternal great-grandmother, was a catalyst. I began experimenting with these threads in high school; they were the access point to a form of expression mark-making using the thread line and imprint. I now have a collection of inherited threads from both sides of the family – a daily material access point to the female makers in my family.

Nana’s Chair

I inherited these chairs from my maternal grandmother Nana. I made new canvas covers for them, and replaced the worn arm strapping with blue rope. I have memories from childhood of these chairs in my grandmother’s home; of family members at the table. I love that they’ve held bodies, conversations, gatherings; that they’ve held family around a table in celebration… and in disagreement. They hold the potential to keep holding, and have been my studio chairs for 10 years.

Ammonite Fossils

These ammonite fossils were given to me and my sister when we were kids by John Parkington, my mother’s stepfather and a professor of archaeology. They are a connection to deep time, to life’s changing cycles, and to archaeology. They are reminders of continuous change, and how matter that feels permeable and fluid can change form, becoming stone under the right conditions. They feel like a starting point from all the way back to my present interest and work in archaeology.

Stone Pine Lino Print

This lino print was given to me by my maternal grandpa Marc, years before he passed away. On the day he passed, I sat watching the evening light change to darkness, the stone pines and the mountain turning from pink to orange to blue, and then to darkness. This is an image that transports me to a memory of a life’s transition – what it means to live a full and present life.

Twin Fish Quilt

My mom made this quilt 37 years ago while pregnant with me. They are the first transmissions I received through her womb – of working with hands and threads; of making in preparation for my birth. I feel that, in some ways, this piece is an early waypoint on the path towards my way of making now. This blanket holds so much of me and who I’ve become. It’s beautiful, and practical, and full of deep symbolism.

Rock Pots

When gardening with my mom about seven years ago, digging in the earth I came across two rocks with holes in their centre. After a good scrubbing, it became clear that these were pottery pieces made by my grandmother, Nana, in 1976. There was something wonderful about finding them buried in the soil in my parents’ back garden – it felt like digging up treasure in a miraculous moment of discovery. There’s still soil that spills out of their centre holes.

Wind Rose Wooden Sea Kayak

Building Wind Rose felt like a rite of passage – a return to tactile, slow and meticulous making. Working on and off, it took me three years to build her, and it was this process that slowly shifted me closer to finding voice, allowing my making way to surface, and trusting that things will find their place in time – and that time is not linear. She was a transition marker, a guide, and a process of learning wooden boatbuilding from my father. Our kayaks – Little Leaf and Wind Rose – are built from the same plans, but slight adjustments that I made to the keelson and the cockpit coaming (the raised rim around the cockpit) make them different. Wind Rose has allowed me to follow ancestral threads of connection to the ocean, seafaring, boatbuilding and navigation. Both boats are built of 3mm Japanese marine plywood, with an Oregon pine keelson, coaming and gunwales.

Nutshell Sailing Boat

My dad built two little wooden nutshell sailing boats during my mom’s pregnancy. I learnt to sail in these boats – they were the porthole and my first interaction with sailing, working with wind, and the craft of wooden boatbuilding. Like the quilt my mom made while I was in utero, I feel that my dad’s process of building these wooden boats transmitted towards a growing Amy. As physical objects, they have been a practical access point to ancestral seafaring, navigation, and interaction with the ocean, rivers and lagoons – but symbolically, they hold so much more. Through both the Twin- Fish quilt and this pair of nutshell sailing boats, I feel very strong ties to who I am in the present, today. | @amy.rusch

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WORDS Palesa Mohola PHOTOS Courtesy of FNB Art Joburg

In a city deemed nobody’s home, FNB Art Joburg has become a gathering where artists, galleries, collectors and cultural producers converge to engage with work that shapes how Africa sees itself and how the world sees Africa.

The fair returns for its 19th edition this year at the Sandton Convention Centre from the 4th to the 6th of September with multiple celebrations from its curated fair sections and public programme, to city-wide initiatives such as Open City, which returns in partnership with Brand South Africa, the BMW Art Generation, and the celebration of Johannesburg’s 140th birthday.

“Johannesburg has always been a place where ambition meets possibility; where artists, entrepreneurs, thinkers and communities arrive carrying different histories and leave having built something entirely new. It is a city propelled by movement, sustained by inquiry and shaped by people willing to imagine beyond what already exists. That restless energy has made Johannesburg one of the continent’s great cultural engines, and it remains the reason FNB Art Joburg continues to call this city home,” says fair director Mandla Sibeko.

With dozens of exhibitors, the fair is designed to highlight a distinct facet of contemporary art in eight specialised sections: Gallery HUB, Gallery LAB, MAX, GIF, INK, AUX, ORG, and the newly added ARC section, ensuring that there is something for everyone.

Gallery HUB: Showcases Africa’s leading galleries, representing institutionally recognised artists shaping global narratives.

MAX: An extension of the fair’s Gallery HUB presents large-scale installations that reimagine scale, space and audience engagement.

Gallery LAB: Curated by Kim Kandan (Fair Manager, FNB Art Joburg), Gallery LAB supports emerging and hybrid spaces that experiment with new modes of presentation and representation.

ORG: Gives visibility to non-profit and artist-run initiatives driving cultural infrastructure and community building.

AUX: Offers talks, screenings and performances that invite audiences into meaningful conversations about art and its contexts.

INK (formerly ETC): Celebrates print culture, spanning critical writing and art publications to artist books and limited-edition prints that acknowledge language and documentation as central to cultural legacy.

GIF: Focuses on photography as one of South Africa’s most significant artistic mediums, tracing both its histories and its futures.

ARC: This new section expands how contemporary artistic practice is encountered at the fair. Dedicated to artists and works that challenge convention, it creates a space for discovery, dialogue and critical inquiry. | artjoburg.com

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INTERVIEW BY Palesa Mohola PHOTOS Courtesy of Berman Contemporay

While many walk along the shore to collect shells and cute pebbles, Thirza collects plastic waste that has washed ashore, which she takes to her studio to make bright and colourful sculptures that are later photographed and disposed of – because her sculptures are not made for permanence, but rather to raise awareness around pollution and to try to prevent, or at least reduce, the use of plastic.

Here, Thirza tells us about her plastic-reuse practices and current body of work.

What first inspired you to create After the Tide, and what story are you hoping this exhibition tells?

“After the Tide is an exhibition curated by Candice Berman (Berman Contemporary), showing a selection of previously unseen works from the Plastic Ocean series, as well as new works specially made for this exhibition. The new works are a series of sculptures photographed against a white background in the bright African sunlight. These playful 3D collages (sculptures) receive full attention in the harsh sunlight against the plain background.

“The exhibition is intended to provoke questions about consumption, idolatry, and what it is we value in our lives today. It also examines our changing relationship with plastics and the increasing and overwhelming presence they have in our lives.”

Your work transforms discarded plastic into still-life photographs. What draws you to finding beauty in materials that most people would overlook?

“I see the beauty in the pieces of plastic washed ashore, aged by the currents, salt, and time. The faded colours made me keep the items I picked up instead of disposing of them. They felt like small treasures that I had found and wanted to keep.”

Can you walk us through your creative process, from collecting plastic on the coastline to producing the final sculpture to photograph?

“At the start of the project, I picked up daily waste from the beaches, created a work each day, and posted it on Instagram. Later, I went on trips to desolate beaches to find even more interesting treasures.

“I built small, one-minute sculptures, which often collapsed while I was photographing them. The unstable structures needed only a breeze of wind to fall into pieces. At one point, I was tempted to make the impermanent structures permanent and started to fix them together.”

Your photographs evoke the style of traditional still-life paintings. Why was it important for you to reference that art-historical tradition in this body of work?

“The Plastic Ocean series provides a kind of Vanitas for the 21st century. Traditional icons of mortality, ephemerality, and wealth have been traded out for bottles, baskets, and bowls: single-use items which are used and discarded, now only existing as empty vessels of destruction.”

Has there been a particular object you’ve found on a beach that stayed with you emotionally or changed the way you think about plastic pollution?

“One of my first finds was a bottle which could still stand on its own, but half of the bottle was gone, as if a shark had taken a bite out of it. What changed the way I think about plastic pollution is the enormous and endless amount of it that I find.”

Your work is at the intersection of art and environmental awareness. Do you see yourself primarily as an artist, an environmental advocate, or both?

“I am primarily an artist with great emotional depth; that is what drives me to make art.

“But honestly, I cannot say one or the other. I would say they are inseparable. The ecological grief I experience is the motor behind my work in Plastic Ocean, the Fatal Flowers painting series, and the personal grief in my figurative paintings.”

Many viewers may initially be captivated by the beauty of your images before realising they’re made from waste. How do you hope that moment of realisation affects them?

“The images show a clash between worlds, offering minimal and aesthetically pleasing compositions which, on closer inspection, instil a sense of ecological grief. Plastic Ocean questions consumption, idolatry, and what it is we value in our lives today. The effect is a quirky, playful, and Pop Art paradox.

“At first glance, the debris do not disgust us. On the contrary, their dainty appearance almost seems to gloss over the ugliness of all the plastic pollution on our beaches. But only for an instant. Our initial attraction soon fades.”

What conversations do you hope After the Tide will spark among audiences here in Cape Town, a city with such a strong connection to the ocean?

“The visibility of the problem is important, and we need to pass our concern on to the younger generation. It should be part of education in schools.”

After spending years documenting plastic pollution through your work, has your own relationship with consumption and sustainability changed? If so, how?

“I learned that we are well-trained consumers, and that is something that should change. We don’t need a new this and that most of the time. ‘Use what you have and buy what you need’ is a slogan that helps me every time I am tempted to buy something.

“I can still be tempted sometimes. What is a great help as well is to sleep on a decision to buy something. You will see that most of the time the urge passes, and you forget about it.” plastic-ocean.net | @thirzaschaap

After the Tide runs until 28 November at Berman Contemporary in the Silo District at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront. | bermancontemporary.com

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WORDS Neyani Mphephu PHOTOS Courtesy of ORMS School of Photography

What happens when you take beauty seriously? When softness becomes a strategy, and joy a form of resistance? These are the questions at the heart of Pretty Serious, the second annual Women’s Month exhibition from ORMS School of Photography and Art School Africa.

Following the inaugural Many Selves in August 2025, the exhibition returns, but the mood has shifted. Pretty Serious explores the playful, excessive, tender, ridiculous, stylish, emotional and joyful dimensions of femininity – qualities so often dismissed as frivolous, yet used here as a delicate art of resistance. It is, at its core, a light feminine touch applied to the long, heavy conversation around womanhood. Invited artists engage with femininity as a space of imagination, exploring what it means to find power in softness, romanticise the everyday, embrace excess, or perform femininity on one’s own terms. The result is a show that resists easy categorisation, leaning into the messy, glorious contradictions of being a woman in 2026.

Curated and produced by Buchanan & Co., a Cape Town-based strategic advisory focused on contemporary art from Africa, the exhibition brings together a wide range of practices spanning painting, photography, sculpture, printmaking, collage and fibre art. Featured artists include:

• Alexia Smit
• Alka Jiven
• Celeste Jacobs
• Edinah Chagwedera
• Inge Prins
• Kauthar Kamish
• Khanyisa Buthelezi
• Kristen McClarty
• Zarah Cassim
• Nina Turok Shapiro
• Lauren Hendricks
• Martha Kubule
• Myra Brown
• Sanell Aggenbach
• Antonia Steyn
• Reem Aljeally
• Sera Holland
• Sharday Swanepoel
• Sundus Saad
• Zimkhitha Mabonga

From established names to emerging voices, the roster reflects a generation of Cape Town-based practitioners redefining what feminine creativity looks like on their own terms and in their own media.

The collaboration brings together three forces with a shared investment in South Africa’s creative future. ORMS has anchored the creative retail landscape for more than 30 years, serving photographers, filmmakers and artists with equipment, fine art printing and educational initiatives such as the Cape Town School of Photography. Art School Africa, a registered non-profit, equips the next generation of artists, curators and writers with the skills to build sustainable careers through education and mentorship. Buchanan & Co., founded by Julia Buchanan, whose background spans Zeitz MOCAA, Norval Foundation and the Harvard University Center for African Studies, guides the project’s curation and production with research and relationships at its core. Together, they have made the Women’s Month exhibition an annual fixture on the Cape Town art calendar.

Pretty Serious is on view until August 2026 at ORMS School of Photography. ormsdirect.co.za | @ormsctsp

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The post Finding Power in the Pretty appeared first on Visi.

WORDS Palesa Mohola PHOTOS Supplied

Sasol New Signatures continues to be South Africa’s longest-running platform for emerging visual artists to showcase their talents and gain recognition and exposure within the art world. This September, 2025 Sasol New Signatures winner Juandré van Eck is exhibiting a new body of work built on the ideas explored in his winning work, Cycles of the Mind – sculptures that invite visitors to interact with them directly, to give the work its breath and, in doing so, discover its voice within the valley.

“Winning Sasol New Signatures has given me the opportunity to push my practice further and realise my ideas on a much larger scale,” says Juandré. “Die Vallei van Adem asks people not simply to look at the work, but to activate it. Every interaction gives the sculptures breath and voice, making each visitor part of the artwork itself.”

Die Vallei van Adem is a fascinating collection of ceramic sound vessels that challenge the traditional relationship between artwork and audience. Each vessel is constructed from two connected chambers, where the smaller works produce higher tones and the larger forms produce deeper sounds, creating something that feels closer to a choir than a collection of individual objects.

“Juandré’s work demonstrates a remarkable understanding of material, concept and audience engagement. He transforms ceramics into something that is not only visually compelling but also deeply experiential, inviting participation in ways that expand our understanding of contemporary sculpture. It is exciting to see how his practice has evolved since winning a Merit award in 2024 and then being crowned the winner last year,” says Cate Terblanche, Sasol Art Curator and Sasol New Signatures judge.

Alongside van Eck’s solo exhibition, this year’s broader Sasol New Signatures show features 123 selected artworks, including works by the Runner-up and Merit Award recipients.

Die Vallei van Adem and the 2026 Sasol New Signatures exhibition will open to the public on 10 September 2026 and run until 8 November 2026. | sasolsignatures.co.za

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WORDS AND PHOTOS Julia Franco

I am Brazilian, and I run a Brazilian design store in Cape Town. Although I left Brazil nearly 20 years ago and have since lived on three continents, some instincts never fade. I remain instinctively drawn to craft , to the human touch in objects and, inevitably, to colour. Distance has given me perspective, but it hasn’t diluted that connection. If anything, it’s clarified it. And the position I now occupy, between Brazil and Africa, sharpened that perspective. In South Africa, too, there is a profound respect for material, for land, for handwork. The dialogue between Brazilian and African craft feels less like import/export, and more like recognition. Both contexts understand scarcity, adaptation, and beauty born from process rather than polish.

So when I flew to São Paulo in February, invited by the Brazilian Association of Utilities and Gift Companies to visit its main fair, I went with curiosity and a long mental shopping list. I’d been before, but this edition felt different: bigger, busier, louder. Hundreds of exhibitors – Brazilian brands and international importers – all gathered in one place, offering a snapshot of what design looks like when industry and creativity share the room. Alongside long-time collaborators of NOSSO, I met a host of new designers and makers.

Some of the most exciting discoveries came from unexpected corners. Cleaning tools, for example – brooms ingeniously designed for pet hair, sponges capable of tackling everything from oil to paint. Even hotel china surprised me: porcelain dishes engineered to maintain the temperature of the food without burning your hands. It was proof that serious design can elevate ordinary objects. Aisle after aisle revealed the most random, inventive and captivating pieces. Walking through the halls, it struck me that Brazilian design mirrors its people– a little messy, theatrical, full of personality. Even the smallest objects seemed to pulse with life. It felt like coming home.

I also noticed an interesting shift: some designers are keeping their collections conceptually local while producing components abroad – in Peru, Turkey or China. It’s a curious but compelling mix, introducing new finishes and materials without losing that Brazilian soul.

Beyond the main fair, I made time to visit smaller, independent studios – the kinds of makers we’re drawn to at NOSSO. In these smaller spaces, work unfolds more slowly and thoughtfully. The visits offered a welcome counterpoint to the grandeur of the exhibition halls, with design revealing itself as a process rather than a product, deeply rooted in material knowledge and in the sheer joy of making.

I was particularly excited to visit an atelier I’d had my eye on for some time: Atelier Da Renata. Renata, a ceramics teacher, started making her own colourful jugs and plates almost as a hobby. Her passion project became something much bigger – so she hired some of her students and today runs a vibrant studio with nine younger artists. Every day at 11am, the kiln is opened and everyone gathers around to see what’s come from the firing, cheering one another’s pieces as they come out. It was genuinely special to witness this ritual; a small daily moment that captures the collaborative spirit of the atelier. Later in the afternoon, at 3pm, they pause again for cake and conversation – an informal for cake and conversation – an informal break dedicated to chatting about studio life. Sadly, I had to miss that, although I suspect it might be just as important to the creative process as the kiln itself.

The trip concluded with a second event, organised by the Brazilian Association of High-End Decor Furniture Industries. Here, ideas that I had seen quietly brewing over the past few years finally emerged, bold and self-assured. It felt like witnessing a creative language that was coming fully into its own.

Comfort, Craft, Materials, Curves, Retro…

I feel the Latino world has been trending, and there’s a special comfort in seeing this world up close. There’s a rhythm, a warmth and a bit of chaos that somehow makes sense. Bad Bunny’s success (yes, I’m a bit obsessed with him right now!) reminds us there’s so much happening in Latin America – music, art, design; an entire world that’s full of personality. With everything else feeling uncertain, it’s grounding to see the beauty in that little mess, that organised chaos, and how it translates into strong colours and organic forms.

Comfort and warmth are in. Everywhere I looked, deep, earthy tones were making interiors feel cosy instead of stiff. They aren’t only used on furniture and details, but on walls and flooring too, making the homes look like a safe space to live in. Fabrics that you want to touch – linen, bouclé, suede, leather – were everywhere, reminders of the idea that a home should be enjoyed and not just looked at.

Handcrafted pieces were presented on a strong setting. They aren’t nostalgic; they are current, confident. Natural materials were a highlight, especially wood mixed with stone or other organic touches. One of my favourite pieces is from a collection that adds natural stone to porcelain, giving an imperfect shape to vases.

I loved seeing materials play off each other: wood, metal, textiles, all working together in balanced ways. Curves are still everywhere, but they are sharper and more precise: it’s structure tempered by softness. Retro elements are also quietly coming back: straw, wicker and outdoor furniture reimagined, giving that familiar feel to new shapes. Upholstered pieces are generous and inviting, quietly waiting for someone to rest on them.

Between Factories and Craft

One of the trip’s biggest takeaways was seeing the industrial and the handmade worlds coexist. On one side, factories are producing with consistency; on the other, small studios are shaping clay, fibres and pigments by hand, with irregularity part of their charm. Rather than competing, these two worlds seem to strengthen each other.

Functional objects are no longer satisfied with efficiency alone. They now aim to improve daily rituals – sleeping, cooking, organising – with a sense of individuality. Even the most practical tools seem to carry a dose of poetry. One cutlery supplier, for example, presented an affordable set with plastic handles that perfectly mimicked leather; the illusion was so convincing you almost couldn’t tell the difference.

Playful, Thoughtful, Human

There was also a strong presence of responsible and thoughtful design – products built to last that are beautiful and comfortable. Authorial design and artistic ceramics are getting more attention in big Brazilian platforms, with an honest connection to materials, usage and time.

But alongside that seriousness, there’s playfulness. Figurative objects – ice buckets shaped like fruit, tables that looked like puzzles, tiny sculptural containers – show that humour and elegance can coexist. Interiors no longer have to be neutral; they’re a reflection of the people who live in them. Colour is a statement. Form tells a story. The tactile and the playful live side by side with confidence, suggesting layered interiors full of intention and character, where every element speaks of time: time devoted to making, time spent composing each layer, time invested in collecting and shaping a space. It felt, instantly, that this young, jovial Brazil is maturing – carrying its history and references with greater depth without losing its spirit.

The Streets in São Paulo

Walking the streets between appointments, I noticed that the city itself feels like a design laboratory. Graffiti, hand-painted signs, street stalls, bold tiles on building facades… all of it feels curated and chaotic at the same time. There’s something comforting about it, actually, because it feels familiar. It’s life in motion: messy, sure – but the chaos has rhythm.

Even small objects can tell a story. A handmade bowl at a fancy restaurant, a brightly coloured chair at the barber, a tiny sculpture hiding in a corner of a shop – they are calling your attention to the moment. It’s as if the makers are saying, “Slow down and look!” And in a world that can feel too fast, the message is comforting.

I also realised that even the shortest trip can change your gaze. I saw familiar colours and textures, but the combinations were new. There’s joy in seeing something traditional, like a straw chair or a clay vase, reinterpreted in a way that feels fresh. That tension between heritage and invention is exactly what makes Brazilian design so alive right now.

Brazilian Design in Transition

Across fairs and studios, the picture is clear: Brazilian design is evolving. It’s rooted in heritage, but open to technology, collaboration and new ways of telling stories. Shape and colour matter – but so does meaning and emotional connection.

For me as the curator at NOSSO, this trip is already shaping what we will bring in next. We don’t chase trends; we listen to makers and the direction design is taking, so we can translate this energy into objects that can live in different contexts while keeping their character intact.

The future looks playful and strong in identity, making even the most practical objects a little surprising. And through it all runs that Latino heartbeat: colourful, imperfect, joyful, reassuring. It’s a reminder that chaos and beauty are not opposites – sometimes, they’re the same thing. | nosso.co.za

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WORDS Steve Smith PHOTOS Inge Prins

Positioned as the city’s first curated private members’ club, the new venue aims to bring together entrepreneurs, creatives, investors and cultural leaders in a setting designed to encourage conversation, collaboration and community.

While exclusivity is inherent to the private members’ club model, Maison Grace places equal emphasis on cultural exchange and meaningful connection. The club has been conceived as a place where members can meet over breakfast, work through the day, entertain clients, or attend an evolving calendar of dinners, wine tastings, talks, literary evenings and live performances.

“Maison Grace was born from a simple observation: when people with shared curiosity and purpose come together in the right setting, something quietly extraordinary happens,” says Development Director Samantha Wallace. “Our ambition was to create a place where people don’t simply visit, but genuinely feel they belong.”

The Art

Art and design are central to that vision. In collaboration with Southern Guild, Maison Grace has assembled a museum-quality collection of contemporary African art that transforms the club into a de facto satellite gallery for the Cape Town gallery, with every work available for purchase. Rather than serving as decoration, the collection has been curated to encourage reflection and conversation, introducing members to some of the continent’s most compelling artistic voices.

Among the highlights are Moroccan artist Amine El Gotaibi’s sculptural steel panel exploring Africa’s natural resources, Terence Maluleke’s evocative A Love Letter to Joburg paintings, and photographs from Zanele Muholi’s acclaimed Somnyama Ngonyama (Hail the Dark Lioness) self-portrait series. Iranian-born, Cape Town-based Kamyar Bineshtarigh’s distinctive glue-transfer works animate the staircase and dining spaces, while additional pieces by Patrick Bongoy, Jesse Ede, Alexandra Karakashian, Daniel Levi, Chuma Maweni, Nandipha Mntambo and Dominique Zinkpè further reinforce the club’s commitment to contemporary African creativity.

The Interiors

The interiors echo the same philosophy. Warm, tactile materials, intimate lounges and carefully considered detailing create spaces that are elegant without feeling formal, with works of art woven seamlessly into the architecture and daily experience of the club rather than confined to gallery walls.

The Food

The culinary offering has been developed in collaboration with Paris Society Consulting, the team behind Parisian restaurants LouLou, Gigi and Coco, balancing international sophistication with a distinctly South African identity. Local produce and wines sit alongside a globally inspired menu, reinforcing the club’s position as both a destination and a gathering place.

Maison Grace is backed by Kasada, the hospitality investment platform behind the neighbouring Cape Grace, a Fairmont Managed Hotel, bringing with it a strong emphasis on attentive service and discreet hospitality.

With membership intentionally limited and by referral, Maison Grace is less about exclusivity for its own sake than creating a community of people who actively contribute to Cape Town’s cultural and entrepreneurial landscape. As the city continues to establish itself as a global creative capital, Maison Grace hopes to become one of its most compelling new addresses – one where hospitality, art and design intersect as naturally as the conversations taking place within its walls. maisongraceclub.com | @maisongraceclub

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