5th Nov, 2020 19:00
Aspire X PLP | African Photography Auction 2020
75
Mandisa Buthelezi (South Africa 1991-)
A Saturday morning eMahlabathini (from the Ekhaya series)
archival pigment ink on cotton rag
Artwork date: 2014
Signature details: signed
Edition: number 2 from an edition of 25
Sold for R9,380
Estimated at R8,000 - R12,000
archival pigment ink on cotton rag
Artwork date: 2014
Signature details: signed
Edition: number 2 from an edition of 25
(1)
image size: 37 x 54 cm, sheet size: 42 x 59 cm, unframed
Notes:
Born in Empangeni, South Africa, Mandisa Buthelezi is a photographer and filmmaker who was raised in the township of Umlazi in Durban. Drawn to the rural life of KwaZulu-Natal, she began her journey as a self-taught photographerdocumenting the social and cultural landscape that exists within the rural and periurban areas of the province. With a vast portfolio that communicates the rural voice and an appreciation and respect for the culture that has informed her perspective, Buthelezi provides photographic content that is country-life centred and explores the notions of culture, identity and spirituality. The importance of cataloguing and documenting African culture through visual art has become an important component of her work through work assignments. This has shaped her notion of sustaining the culture that surrounds her. Buthelezi presently lives and works between Johannesburg and Durban. A Saturday morning eMahlabathini was taken at 5am on a Saturday morning in Mahlabathini, in the rural outskirts of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. With buckets in hand and head, the girls collect water for their families. The image is part of an ongoing project titled Ekhaya, a body of work that explores the rural and peri urban areas in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces. The project unpacks concepts of identity, social and cultural shifts that currently exist in modern-day South Africa and that take place when people navigate from one environment to another. A Saturday morning eMahlabathini (lot 75) was runner up in the Open Society Foundation’s Social Justice through The Lens Competition in June 2016. Izithunzi Zami (lot 76) is a visual diary of the spiritual identity of a young woman. Set in a foreign environment, it speaks of an unusual encounter the subject has with herself, often displaying gestures of discomfort and darkness. This forces her to face and challenge issues of identity, gender and spirituality. This internal conversation metaphorically sees the unfolding of dialogue through the frame and forms bold imagery that embraces the coexistence of shadow and light. Semaphore Gallery of African Contemporary Art, Neuchâtel (2017) and AMANDLA! South African Women’s Photographers, curated by Neo Ntsoma, at the Pingyao International Photography Festival, Confucius Temple, Pingyao (2016).
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Auction: Aspire X PLP | African Photography Auction 2020, 5th Nov, 2020
A collection of pan-African works, straddling the terrain between historical and contemporary photography, were auctioned to support the digitisation of African photographic legacies by the Photography Legacy Project (PLP). Bidders participated from across Europe, the USA and UK, Asia, Australia and Africa – a testament to Aspire’s increasing global reach and collectors’ enthusiasm for African photography.
The auction included photographic luminaries such as David Goldblatt, Alf Kumalo, G.R. Naidoo, Ranjith Kally and Ian Berry, as well as more contemporary internationally acclaimed photographers like Guy Tillim, Jo Ractliffe, Syowia Kyambi and Mikhael Subotzky. The lead lot, a portfolio of 12 silver gelatin prints from the legendary photographer Ernest Cole’s seminal 1967 book House of Bondage sold for an astounding R569,000 – a new world auction record.
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