Dr. Kirsty Coventry, Minister of Youth, Sport, Arts, and Recreation, has announced Zimbabwe’s participation in the 60th International Art Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia. Zimbabwe will stage the concert for the seventh time in a row, a record for an African country on this world-renowned venue.
Image courtesy of Art Africa
Gillian Rosselli, Sekai Machache, Moffat Takadiwa, Kombo Chapfika, and Troy Makaza will be exhibiting at the 60th La Biennale di Venezia in 2024 as part of Zimbabwe’s Pavilion. These visual artists will exhibit in Venice, Italy, from April 20th to November 24th, 2024.
“As Government, we have seen many careers flourish from this platform,” Dr. Coventry said; “In line with NDS1, this platform has been critical in the Image Building and persuasion of international cooperation and it offers new engagement in the Cultural sphere.”
Gillian Rosselli is a Zimbabwean visual artist. She uses a variety of mediums, including acrylic, chalk, collage, wax, and soil. Rosselli’s art demonstrates a strong connection to and preoccupation with humanity’s difficulties, ranging from the socioeconomic inequities of migration to the effects of colonialism on society and culture. Her art has been included in various public and private collections in Zimbabwe and around the world.
Sekai Machache (she/they) is a Glasgow-based Zimbabwean-Scottish visual artist and curator. Her work is an in-depth examination of the concept of self, in which photography plays an important part in facilitating the discovery of the historical and cultural imaginary. She has recently expanded her work to include various mediums and ways that can serve to conjure the invisible and undocumented. She is fascinated by the connection between spirituality, dreaming, and the artist’s responsibility in propagating symbolic imagery to give a space for healing in the face of colonization and loss.
Sekai received the RSA Morton Award in 2020 and is an artist in residence with the Talbot Rice Residency Programme 2021-2023.
Moffat Takadiwa (b. 1983, Karoi) lives and works in Harare, Zimbabwe. Part of the post-independence generation of artists in Zimbabwe, Takadiwa has exhibited extensively across major institutions in Zimbabwe as well as internationally. Recent exhibitions include Zero Zero, Semiose, Paris (2023, solo); Vestiges of Colonialism, National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare (2023, solo); A Love Letter to LA, curated by Storm Ascher, Superposition Gallery, Phillips Auction House, Los Angeles (2023); Nous sommes tous des lichens, Musée d’art contemporain de la Haute-Vienne – château de Rochechouart (2022); The Bull, Semiose, Paris (2022, solo); and Brutalized Language, Nicodim, New York (2022, solo).
Kombo Chapfika is skilled in drawing, painting, design, animation, coding, and installations. He believes that art transcends a single medium and that each discipline informs the other. He is known for combining elements of African and Western pop iconography, patterns, installations, and surreal elements to reveal unspoken subconscious narratives.
Troy Makaza (b. 1995, Harare) creates woven works from painted silicone strings, creating a threadlike spider web. His broader examination of the fluid and in-flux relationships between the sexes in contemporary Zimbabwe bound together powerful metaphors for social and intimate spaces, where traditional values and liberal attitudes are no longer assured. His works have been included in exhibitions at the Museum of Modern African Art al Maaden (MACAAL) in Marrakech, the Kunstlaboratorium in Norway, the Zeitz MoCAA in Cape Town, and the National Gallery of Zimbabwe. He is represented by First Floor Gallery.
The exhibition will be curated by Fadzai Veronica Muchemwa.
