Buqaqawuli Nobakada’s mixed media works are poignant expressions of the Black, female experience. Her works define what it means to be a woman – that contemplative, tender resolve that embodying femininity often asks of us, and what it means to take up space, and the responsibility of this. For Buqaqawuli, her forthright purpose as an artist is to craft imagery that younger girls may see, especially Black girls, and realise that those foregrounds are precisely the spaces that they can inhabit. In our conversation below, Buqaqawuli’s retrospection of her work depicts the precise and critical need that art serves; art is not frivolous, it is an inherent requirement for shifting, healing and articulating the consciousness of human beings. On the matter of who she paints for, Buqaqawuli describes why her recents works showcase luxury settings, “I had a conversation with a cousin of mine who comes from  the context I started in and I remember telling her I wanted a house with an infinity pool and she didn’t understand what that was, and I decided that that’s the kind of thing I want to paint. She’s never seen someone that looks like her in that sort of space, owning or existing around those kind of things so she can’t dream it or work towards it because even if she looks through a magazine with luxury homes, the little white picket fence family in the magazine doesn’t look like her or anyone in  her immediate surrounding so she grows up thinking she doesn’t deserve to live like that or she  doesn’t belong there: that’s the thing I want to change. That’s why I paint the girls in the fast cars and lace fronts, so my younger self can dream.”

Toward her professional emergence in the art world, Buqaqawuli is a fine artist for whom I feel destiny will be made manifest. There is no greater alchemy than the kind of intellectual and social depth that Buqaqawuli demonstrates in our conversation –  I will leave the rest of your understanding of Buqaqawuli, in her own words, below.

How did you arrive at being an artist – what were some of the most formative moments that showed you that this was your path?

It’s interesting because on a craftsman level it’s something I’ve always been naturally good at, I  don’t know where to say I may have learnt it. Since I was a child I’ve been interested in making beautiful decorative things as a hobby. Things changed when I was in grade 10, I had taken Visual Arts as one of my academic majors and my art teacher at the time was very adamant on art class excursions to artist studios. I vividly remember a trip to bag factory studios and a talk with the late Benon Lutaaya in his studio on one of those small school excursions. That was the  first time I understood art as a career. The world and my immediate family had kind of trained me into believing that art is something reserved for the ‘hobby’ category and it’s not something  to be taken too seriously. Still, I wasn’t completely convinced, and then I did  architecture at Wits for a year and I absolutely hated it, I had friends studying fine art so I  would skip my construction lectures and go sit in their classes, and even in architecture school, I was really good at the design and drawing side of things, my lecturer at some point criticised  me saying that I design like an artist and not an architect – I took that as a sign and never looked back really.  

It just became a ripple effect, I’m still seeing it now. Every time I see South African artists showcasing their work all over the world, doing creative collaborative projects with huge renowned  brands like Cristian Dior and Gucci, all of it is affirming that what I’m doing is valuable and that  the journey isn’t as simple as selling paintings, there’s a whole world of creativity that I get to  unlock, and painting is just the first step of the beautiful journey that is to come.  

Now that I’ve completely surrendered to the craft I’m also realising how important art is in anthropological study. It’s a reflection of people and their beliefs and how these beliefs are  performed in different times. Art is about politics, it’s about science, it’s about collective memory and psychology, culture conservation – it’s about representation and storytelling. It’s important, and  now that I realise its importance I feel a responsibility to share it with the world.  

Can you talk about your medium and materials, the stippled way that you create your figures?

I prepare paper with lace fabric and then paint on that prepared paper. I enjoy this process because it  adds a layer of detail to the work that dares you to stare a little longer, and it also has a lot to do with the dimensionality of the subjects I’m presenting. They aren’t simply figures so in my mark making, I try to reflect not just the shape that we see with the eye but to bring forth the complex femininity of  my subjects. We’re never just one thing, and telling a layered story with still images is a difficult thing. I use the details on the mark making to present layers of the story to audiences.

Who are the figures and women in your works, and what does it mean to focus on the feminine as your muse?

My work is very autobiographical in its nature, so a lot of the time my work is about my own  navigation of my femininity and sensuality in a changing world. So I paint myself and the women in my immediate surroundings because those are the stories I’m reflecting back at the world. It’s  also beautiful because my work grows as I grow. I remember switching degrees from architecture to fine art and there was a shift in the kinds of spaces I was in and thus the kind of women I  painted changed. In the school of arts I’m coming across bold, more regal women, with brighter  hair and larger personalities and now I’ve got a whole series of portraits of women based on the  way I see beauty and femininity being performed around me.  

I also paint largely for my younger self. In my recent body of work I’m painting women in the nude  in imagined luxurious architectural spaces: this is a love letter to young me, telling myself that I, a black girl from the most rural parts of the Eastern Cape, deserve repose, I deserve rest, I deserve to  take up beautiful spaces – so that’s what I paint. We need to see ourselves in the ways that we want to exist, it’s a form of manifestation. I had a conversation with a cousin of mine who comes from  the context I started in and I remember telling her I wanted a house with an infinity pool and she  didn’t understand what that was, and I decided that that’s the kind of thing I want to paint. She’s never seen someone that looks like her in that sort of space, owning or existing around those kind of  things so she can’t dream it or work towards it because even if she looks through a magazine with  luxury homes, the little white picket fence family in the magazine doesn’t look like her or anyone in  her immediate surrounding so she grows up thinking she doesn’t deserve to live like that or she  doesn’t belong there: that’s the thing I want to change. That’s why I paint the girls in the fast cars and lace fronts, so my younger self can dream.  

What is your vision right now as a young, fine artist in South Africa?

My vision, or curiosity rather, is our collaboration and engagement with other artistic  disciplines on a global level. Art isn’t simply about art objects anymore, and I’d like to watch  how our potential unfolds. I’m enjoying seeing South African artists doing shows all over the world and collaborating with other large creative enterprises. It’s like we’ve challenged ourselves to take our stories to every corner of this earth and it’s a beautiful thing to be a  part of.

Written by: Holly Beaton

Shaquille-Aaron Keith is a polymath in the true sense of the word. It is one thing to be creative and to have a handle on one’s chosen medium; it’s another thing entirely to utilise multiple mediums of expression, and for these threads to weave indistinguishably into a unified expression – for Shaquille, this expression is as honest and heartfelt as he is. To be an artist in the 21st century is to navigate all manner of digital and physical realities; and to be an artist today, is to squarely face constraints in the face, and walk straight past them and effortlessly into the proverbial sunset. You may know Shaquille from the cult-status Youtube channel PAQ; a space where streetwear reverberated across the screens of nearly a million subscribers, and one of the first of its kind to showcase our generation as defining fashion content production, discussion and dissemination. Its archive, with the show being on a tentative hiatus, is a goldmine; and its four presenters have splintered off to make their solo mark on the world. Shaquille’s current work is a rich intersection between fashion and art; as a painter, poet, animator, model and cultural archivist; and his most recent stop along the way was right in Cape Town, for Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2023, exhibiting for Eclectica Contemporary.

Image Courtesy of Eclectica Contemporary.

“I used to watch a lot of anime with my older siblings, I’m the youngest of four. My two older brothers introduced me to Dragon-Ball Z, and I used to try and draw Goku when he went Super Saiyan; obviously they were really bad, but I liked how my interpretation was coming out, and seeing how I could distil a moment in animation that contains many frames, into one picture. I think those years of my childhood drawing with friends, surrounded by tons of pencils, are some of the most important moments to me until this day.” Shaquille reminisces, and the nuance of TV as hand-drawn, digitised worlds are something almost inarticulable to those of us raised on cartoons and anime. I still count Beerus, Dragon-Ball Z’s God of Destruction, as one of my patron saints. For Shaquille, his creativity hasn’t stopped flowing since those formative years – whether it was the first art-kit given to him by his mum, or his introduction to the mindful, soothing nature of brush strokes and paint. Drawing, though, was a mainstay throughout school, “I used to draw in every class, except for art class – because I knew I could learn something in art class. I used to get detention all the time, and letters sent home, saying ‘Shaquille is drawing pictures in class that he thinks is good’ and what bothered me about each letter is that they made a point to say that ‘he thinks’ it’s good. Man, those were my first critics, and it was my first challenge.” Growing up in South London, Shaquille’s version of grade 10 meant that students are able to specialise through ‘GCSEs’ – an education framework which for British kids, is a version of matriculation that we know here in South Africa. When his teachers advised his mum that he should follow the GCSE art pathway, all those years of drawing came to be recognised – finally, “when I went to college, I wanted to try something different – I’d been drawing for 12 years, and I wanted to see how that would translate digitally. So media studies was a beautiful, broad overview that taught me to develop varying skills, with animation being the stand-out medium that I found. I remember learning to do a GIF, and it blew my mind; if I didn’t loop the frames at the end, I had a consistent animation. That opened up a whole new realm for me.” Phantasia(i) in Motu depicts Shaquille’s animation style – hand drawn illustration, evoking flow that binds together the movement of a body dancing, and it’s from this place that his style had begun to develop. A style that is underpinned by pop cultural references, and deepening as it moves into Shaquille’s symbology-heavy works depicting Blackness, British-ness, culture, love, pain and memory. A stand-out work from 2022 is titled ‘Gentrification (Communal Genocide)’. The painting hides within it varying, surrealist style depictions of a changing neighbourhood of his youth, Lewisham in South-east London. When I describe Shaquille as a cultural archivist, this is precisely what I mean – in his observation and contemplation of his surroundings, everywhere in the world, he uses his calling and purpose as an artist to comment and cultivate dialogue. Shaquille did this with PAQ, and he does so with his artistic practice.

GENTRIFICATION (COMMUNAL GENOCIDE). 2022.

Shaquille’s primary form of written dialogue is poetry. Initially, this was the art-form that he was approached for by VSCO for a campaign, but around this time, three years ago, Shaquille began to share the multiplicity of his skills.“Poetry and painting are one in the same to me, and because I don’t separate them, I find that they add weight to each other. I really like being able to have each of them inform the other. When it comes to poetry, it is more directly in my paintings than just as accompanying text. My favourite artist of all time, Nas, is a poet and every time he tells a story, it’s incredibly detailed. I reference his art-form of rap in the way that I work. The background is the beat, and towards the foreground is the first verse – second verse is how the background and foreground interact with each other, and then the hook is the little details that the viewer might have to look at twice, and maybe that showcases a kind of technical ability. When it comes the work ‘Gentrification’ for example, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how there’s no lines I won’t cross, really, in the name of art and to tell a message.’’ 

As a self-professed romantic, Shaquille owes his poetry to wanting to woo girls at 16 years old; and the kind of poignant, heart centred tone remains in his work today, gripping the reader. This caught the attention of Gucci Beauty, too – when Shaquille was invited to create a series of original poetry for a series of lipsticks, “with Beauty Papers Magazine, I got to work with Gucci, which was so surreal. I got to see how my work can exist in a commercial space, and Gucci in particular is amazing in allowing their creators and collaborators to have free-reign. I really felt I could be as abstract as I could be, and they showcased my poems in my handwriting. It felt very earnest.”

 I can’t hear you, It’s Picture day. 2023. Mixed media on board, 120 x 150 cm.

It’s Shaquille’s first time in Africa, so being here has been deep, “I think when I knew I hit heaven, was when I was on Chapman’s Peak, wedged between this great ocean and the mountain. I think the artwork out here is so vibrant, and I feel like the colours of Cape Town in general are just on another level. I didn’t see Cape Town as being a part of my plans for 2023, but when I met Marli and Shamiela in Paris at AKAA, it led to them being invited to the Investec Art Fair. I’ve met so many incredible artists and people – and I’ve even extended my stay. I was supposed to fly home, today; and honestly? I want to rent a place and come and be here for a few months. I can see myself creating here, and travelling through the country.” Shaquille speaks of his experience here in the way that he speaks of his career; with excitement, and the energy of purpose. Art, in all its forms beckoned Shaquille as a young kid, pencils in hand, and now; the vision continues to be revealed, wherever in the world this purpose might take him.

Images by Robin Jones and Nicholas Farmer, with gratitude to Eclectica Contemporary.

Written by: Holly Beaton

Porky Hefer’s work exists as a bridge between the natural world and us humans – our need for design, and incisive penchant for biomimicry. There is perhaps no more a truthful or practical, or regal and hilarious, reference than that offered to us by nature; even in our bricked homes and concrete city-scapes; we are always seeking out the seedling that’s erupting through the pavement cracks. Porky has built his entire reality around this; himself, an antenna for receiving codes and caveats from the natural world. I’m not sure if it’s intentional or that for Porky, it’s the only authentic way to create the way he does; that is, to reflect natural phenomena in startling designs such as his ever-evolving Weaver’s Nest chairs and pods, and to do so through mostly hand-made methods and using indigenous materials. It is this simplistic honesty in Porky’s work – to reference and mimic nature and to do so compassionately towards nature – that sets the designer apart in a very serious, contemporary design landscape. I feel, when looking at his work, the inner-child leaps out of me; that little kid who still dreams of living in a tree-house. This evocative ability, among Porky’s technical and creative brilliance, marks a genius. 

On the back of a very busy art week, and his fourth solo exhibition at Southern Guild Gallery, we asked Porky a few questions.

Your shift from being an acclaimed creative director to a designer is incredible – in reflection, how did your former career initiate the artist that you are today?

Advertising is/was an incredible industry. It’s very tough; crazy deadlines, late hours and very, very, competitive. I definitely met the most creative and talented people I have ever encountered. People like John Hunt and many others taught me everything and how to implement it, and it really affected the way that I think and approach problems. Mainly, it taught me how to think quickly and to vary my thinking process over and over, rather than approaching problems in the same way every time. I learnt how to create concepts with a past and a future, and that had a life, rather than just a moment or an object. I learnt about being strategic and understanding a market or demographic. I learnt how to sell. I learnt about craft and making things the best they can possibly be, rather than just simply making it. I learnt about being prepared and having your shit together. I learnt how to drink tequila until 4am and be at work at 6am. I learnt about working together with the best. I learnt about cooperation. I learnt to say no. I learnt how to delegate. I learnt how to disrupt. I learnt about competition and how to be competitive. I learnt to be not just good, but great.

Nature is your most critical reference – how do you consider the natural world throughout your process?

I stare at the small things that most people would walk past. I find nature fascinating and incredible – it constantly blows my mind. The small things’ habits, their societies, their beauty, their intelligence, their resilience, their strength, their love, their innocence. It is endless. Their inspiration is never-ending. In truth, I love animals more than humans.

The playful, tongue-in-cheek energy in your work sets you apart from the often-austere contemporary design language of today. Can you talk about having a sense of humour in your work?

I find humour the most important aspect of my work. I try to design my pieces so they will elicit a smile, a laugh, or a wow from the viewer or user. I always attempt to shift the state of mind or body into a happier state. Quite often, my pieces make people feel like a child again, and that’s a powerful thing. In fact, very often, children are my biggest fans: they love my work. More often than not, my work has a message I am trying to convey – I find it easier to win someone over if you start off on a positive note rather than trying to shock someone into opening up their mind.

Porky Hefer, Chaos Calamus, 2023. Cr. Hayden Phipps, S Guild.

Your latest solo exhibition, Volume 4. Chaos Calamus – Interspecies Reciprocal Altruism, is a study on the magnificence and essentiality of the microbial world. Could you offer any thoughts on how the microscopic revealed itself to you, leading to this body of work?

I once read that early sci-fi writers, because of the fact that they had zero information about the universe, planets, or even the moon, had to rely on their own imaginations for source material for inventing their new worlds. Some would study nature, such as insect colonies and behaviour for their inspiration, and some went a bit deeper into the microscopic communities – and that’s what I decided to do: to delve into these microscopic worlds to see what I could find.

The first image of an amoeba was produced by August Johann Rösel von Rosenhof in 1755, who named his discovery “the little Proteus”, after Proteus, the shape-shifting sea-god of Greek mythology. The amoeba is the ultimate shape-shifter and can change its form at will simply by changing the state of its outer-walls and the fluids in its body. It extends in a desired direction by creating extensions called pseudopods, or false feet. These finger-like shapes balloon outwards, pulling the rear of its cell forward. They are adapting their shape constantly, evolving according to the immediate context or environment they find themselves in. This absolutely blew my mind. it’s the ultimate sci-fi creature.

The show starts with a round simplistic form which is typical of my first nests. But as we see the other pieces in the show, they start growing pseudopods and oozing off in different directions for different reasons. I wanted to evolve my shapes and forms, and oozing them out seemed the natural way to go. Cyclosis and Sol-Gel are first stages of the shape shift and these extensions provide space for you to slip your feet into. 

In Pseudopodium, the extension has oozed down onto the floor, creating a seating area to accommodate another occupant. Binary Fission is the point when a cell divides into two – this piece is the moment just before splitting, creating two ends where people can sit facing each other, feet touching.

Porky Hefer, Portait, 2022. Cr. Hayden Phipps, SGuild.

Volume 4. Chaos Calamus – Interspecies Reciprocal Altruism is on at Southern Guild until 1 April 2023.

Image credit: courtesy of Hayden Phipps/Southern Guild

Written by: Holly Beaton