VukuvukuPhila!
ivukuvuku
interdisciplinary artist, researcher and writer
ivukuvuku is from eMgwenyane village in Tsomo, in the Eastern Cape. She is a multi-dimensional artist who works across disciplines of performance, installation art, painting, glass, ceramics, writing, photography and film. In her work, she explores themes of memory, healing, history and ancestry. ivukuvuku completed her Bachelor’s Degree in Fine and Applied Arts at the Tshwane University of Technology (2019), majoring in glass and painting.
The name ivukuvuku is based on the realisation of how a piece of cloth, sometimes unpleasant represent the rebirth of a transformed self, and celebrates a healed versions of self. This means a way that revives the character of what was once discarded, then later brought into life as a rebirth of ivukuvuku (self). By mostly using sackcloth to unite all the details entailed in her artworks, ivukuvuku is a healer and a healing spirit to (her)self(ves). She describes the sackcloth as a skin; the celebration of (her)sel(ves) that suspends the societal beliefs of how ivukuvuku should identify.
The sackcloth is also a symbolic healing of memory that represents the active processes of reconnecting and recreating relationships within the sacred and ancestral spaces where the presence of her nature, in places like rivers, swamps and gravel paths in her village. As a result, the sackcloth undergoes the elements of water, fire, wind and sun before it is incorporated with beadwork, fire, smoke, lace, sewing, photography and writing.
ACADEMIC BACKGROUND
2020 : Bachelor of Technology, Tshwane University of Technology, Fine and Applied Arts, majoring in glass and painting
2010 : Mida School,, Eastern Cape
WORK EXPERIENCE
2013-2015 : Hot shop assistance: Glass Studio, Tshwane University of Technology
WORKSHOPS ATTENDED
2023 : Art is Community: Building and Developing Artists. Turbine Art Fair Unearthed Mentorship program, Johannesburg. South Africa.
2016 : The Art Source South Africa. 2016
2006 : Peer Educator Trained, Mgwenyane J. S. S. The Eastern Cape Department of Education Life Skills. 2006.
CONFERENCES
2023 : GendV Project Symposium, UJ Humanities Common Room, University of Johannesburg
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 : Turbine Art Fair Unearthed 2023, Augmented Realities. Johannesburg. South Africa
2022 : You can make yourself at home, Virtual Exhibition. www.wenaekhaya.art
2019 : Living Legends, University of Pretoria with Mama Helen Sebidi. Pretoria
2013 :Our Icons, Digital Online Exhibition. Edition 1.2,. https://youtu.be./0t9V33ZrArY Contemporary Glass in South Africa with Gerry King. Tshwane University of Technology. South Africa.
COLLABORATIVE PERFORMANCES
2023 : Ekhaya : Kept Silence, Melrose Gallery. Johannesburg. South Africa
: E N K U N D L E N I /pouring healing, Melrose Gallery. Johannesburg. South Africa
: Reflections of Reflected Self, The GendV Project Symposium. University of Johannesburg. South Africa
2022 :A bed called home : shared pain and healing, Melrose Gallery. Johannesburg. South Africa
RESIDENCY
2023 : Turbine Art Fair Unearthed
