Material, metaphor and the black body are the tools that Mohau Modisakeng uses to explore the influence of South Africa’s violent history that has been ignored in today’s society, on how we understand our cultural, political, and social roles as human beings in post-colonial Africa and in particular post-apartheid South Africa.
Represented through film, large-scale photographic prints, installations and performances, his “work doesn’t start off with an attempt to portray violence but it becomes mesmerising because although we might recognise history as our past, the body is indifferent to social changes, so it remembers.”
Mohau Modisakeng was born in Soweto in 1986 and lives and works between Johannesburg and Cape Town. He completed his undergraduate degree at the Michaelis School of Fine Art, Cape Town in 2009 and worked towards his Master’s degree at the same institution. His work engages race, the militarisation of society and the deep divides of post-apartheid South Africa and the post-colonial continent. He interrogates the collective narratives that inform our experience of the world, in particular those that evoke the black body as a site of fragmentation and distortion.
Modisakeng was finalist in the MTN New Contemporaries in 2010, awarded the Sasol New Signatures Award for 2011, Standard Bank Artist of the year (VISUAL ART) 2016. He has also represented South Africa at the South African Pavilion at 56th and 57th Venice Biennial in 2015 and 2017. Modisakeng has also presented commissioned projects for Performa Biennialle in 2017 and Sharjah Bienniale in 2019.
He has exhibited at VOLTA NY, New York (2014); the Saatchi Gallery, London (2012); Dak’Art Biennale, Dakar (2012); Focus 11, Basel (2011); and Stevenson, Cape Town (2010). In 2013 he produced an ambitious new video work in association with Samsung as a special project for the 2013 FNB Joburg Art Fair. His work is included in public collections such as the Johannesburg Art Gallery, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town and the Saatchi Gallery, London as well as in significant private collections such as Zeitz MOCAA.
UPCOMING/CURRENT
“Passage” - Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University October 2022
“Shout Plenty” - African Artists' Foundation (AAF) in Lagos, Nigeria August 2022
“The Water Drummer” - The Well-being Summit. Bilbao Spain May 2022
“Zion” - The photography Show presented by AIPAD May 2022
Nelson Mandela Monument “RONE BATHO” City of Amsterdam Launch. NL/ 3 September 2021
NIROX SCULPTURE PARK - PASSAGE and other works. Johannesburg /OCTOBER 2021
PASSAGE - Uncertain Horizon @ The Museum Centre of Turku, Finland/2021
New Commission @ THE WELLBEING PROJECT’S BILBAO SUMMIT, Spain/ May 2022
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2020
‘FRAMES” series @ KUNSTRAUM INNSBRUCK, Austria/ 2020
PASSAGE @ Fotografiska, Stockholm, Sweden/ 2020
UBUNTU @ National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens, Greece/ 2020
PASSAGE @ Oakland Museum of California/ October 2020
El Espacio23 Contemporary Art Space: Zanj / 2020
Virtual Exhibition - Of Beauty, Blackness & Power @ Arendt/ 2020
Jenkins Johnson Project Space. NYC/February 2020
Armory. Galerie Ron Mandos. NYC/ March 2020
Mohau Modisakeng @ Braverman Gallery, Tel Aviv/ May 2020
2019
The Last Harvest, 21st Contemporary Art Biennial Sesc_Videobrasil, Sao Paolo
Land of Zanj, Sharjah Biennial 14: Leaving the Echo Chamber, Sharjah UAE
Bagamoyo, Mohau Modisakeng at Ron Mandos, Amsterdam
No Serenity HERe, Click Festival, Copenhagen
Passage at Schneider Museum of Art, Oregon USA.
…
2018
In their own form, MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY, Chicago
EX AFRICA, Mohau Modisakeng at the Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil
KIN, Mohau Modisakeng at Sabrina Amrani gallery, Spain
PASSAGE, In the footsteps of the Garden of Eden, Szentendre
2017
Zion, PERFORMA17, New York
Lefa la Ntate, Tatham Art Gallery, Pietermaritzburg
Lefa la Ntate, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg
Lefa la Ntate, Johannes Stegmann Art Gallery,University of the Free State
Passage - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2016
Bophirima, Tyburn Gallery, London
ENDABENI, Galerie Ron Mandos, Amsterdam
Lefe La Ntate, Monument Gallery, Grahamstown National Arts Festival, Grahamstown
Mohau Modisakeng, Laumeier Sculpture Park, Saint Louis, Missouri
Lefa La Ntate, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
Adam Aronson Fine Arts Center, Laumeier Sculpture Park, St Louis, USA
Lefa La Ntate, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Art Museum, Port Elizabeth
2015Ke Kgomo Ya Moshate, Kunstrum, Innsbruck
Mohau Modisakeng, Big Pond Artworks, Munich, Germany
2014
VOLTA NY, BRUNDYN+, New York
Loop Barcelona, Hotel Catalonia Ramblas, Barcelona
Ditaola, BRUNDYN+, Cape Town
Mohau Modisakeng, Chavonnes Battery Museum, Cape Town (in partnership with Zeitz MOCAA)
2013
Inzilo, Video Art Powered by Samsung Special Project, FNB Joburg Art Fair, Johannesburg
2012
Sera, Master of Fine Art Exhibition, Michaelis School of Fine Art, Cape Town
VOLTA NY, BRUNDYN +, New York
Untitled, A solo exhibition in recognition of his Sasol New Signatures Award for 2011, Pretoria Art Museum, Pretoria
2010
Ibutho, Side Gallery, Stevenson, Gallery, Cape Town
2009
Ugufa Unezindaba’, Graduate Exhibition, Michaelis School of Fine Art, Cape Town
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2017
EX AFRICA, Belo Horizonte, Brasília, São Paulo Rio de Janeiro
Le Jour Qui Vient, Galerie des Galeries, Paris
Another Antipodes Exhibition: Urban Axis, PS Art Space, Fremantle WA, Australia
The 57th Venice Biennale - The South African Pavilion, Sale d’Armi, Arsenale, Venice
2016
Fünf Seen Film Festival, Starnberg, Germany
Re(as)sisting Narratives, Framer Framed, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Prefer Life, Reydan Weiss Collection, The Weserburg, Bremen, Germany
62nd International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, Germany
When Tomorrow Comes, Wits Art Museum, Johannesburg / Michaelis Galleries, Cape Town
After the Thrill is Gone, Gwen Frostic School of Art, Michigan
Negative Space - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
Lagos Photo Festival, Lagos, Nigeria
2015
The 56th Venice Biennale - The South African Pavilion, Sale d’Armi, Arsenale, Venice
AFIRIperFOMA, Lagos, Nigeria.
2015 Joburg Art Fair - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg
NIROX Winter Sculpture Fair, Nirox Foundation, Johannesburg
DIS/PLACE, MoCADA, Brooklyn, New York
Broken English, Tyburn Gallery, London
What Remains is Tomorrow, South African Pavilion, Venice Bienniale
La Fabrique De L'Homme Moderne, in resonance with Lyon Biennale, La Fabric, Solomon Foundation for Contemporary Art, Annecy
Foreign Bodies - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2014
Brave New World…20 Years of Democracy, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
Loop Art Fair, Silencio Club, Paris
!Kauru 2014: Rerouting Dialogue 1994- 2014, UNISA Gallery, Pretoria
START Art Fair, BRUNDYN+, Saatchi Gallery, London
Art Against the Wall: An Artist Response to Civil Wars, Gallery 72, Atlanta, Georgia
Fearless Renewal, MC Theatre, Amsterdam
FNB Joburg Art Fair, BRUNDYN +, Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg
Anyway, the Wind Blows, BRUNDYN +, Cape Town
Here Today, The Old Sorting Office, London
GIPCA Live Art Festival, City Hall, Cape Town
Performing Portraiture, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
2013
FNB Joburg Art Fair, BRUNDYN +, Johannesburg
Am I not a Man and a Brother? Am I not a Woman and a Sister, James Harris Gallery, Seattle
Personal and Political, 21c Museum, Louisville, Kentucky
Biennale Internationa d’Art Contemporain (BIAC), Fort de France, Martinique
Ceci n’est pas une Summer Show, BRUNDYN+, Cape Town
2012Out of Focus: Photography, Saatchi Gallery, London
Exuberance Project Exhibition, Mandela Rhodes Gallery, Cape Town
Uneveness Exhibition, National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare
NEWSFEED: Anonymity & Social Media in African Revolutions and Beyond, MoCADA, New York
Dak’Art Biennale, Dakar
Material Representation, BRUNDYN +, Cape Town
FNB Joburg Art Fair, BRUNDYN +, Johannesburg
2011
Focus 11, Basel
Implemented Environments, BRUNDYN+, Cape Town
Business Day, FNB Joburg Art Fair, Johannesburg
2010A RE FANON, with Lerato Bereng, Blank Projects, Cape Town
PERMANENT COLLECTIONS
Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (Zeitz MOCAA) Johannesburg Art Gallery
IZIKO South African National Gallery
Saatchi Gallery
21C Museum Hotel University of South Africa (UNISA)
New Church Museum
Piet Viljoen Collection
Wendy Fisher Emile Stipp Collection
Manuel de Santaren Salsali Private Museum
The Ekard Collection
Mohau is represented by Ron Mandos Gallery (Amsterdam), Jenkin Johnson (USA), Braverman Gallery (ISRAEL). For all local queries please contact our Mohau Modisakeng Studio info@mohaumodisakengstudio.com
A list of his upcoming works and exhibitions are available at www.mohaumodisakengstudio.com.