Zazi

A Zulu artist and activist, Zanele Muholi is a non-binary South African photographer who has received international acclaim for their striking self-portraits and their photographs of South African black lesbian and transgender communities.

Born in 1972 under apartheid in Umlazi, a township outside Durban, Muholi worked as a hair stylist before moving to Johannesburg to study photography at the Market Photo Workshop, founded by documentary photographer David Goldblatt. Influenced by the social documentary photography of Nan Goldin and Diane Arbus, Muholi said they ‘longed for something that was black’.

A compelling black-and-white self-portrait shot in Boston in 2019, Zazi is a gelatin-silver photograph from the acclaimed series Somnyama Ngonyama (Hail the Dark Lioness), in which the artist photographs themselves in locations around the world, far from home, and uses the materials and elements of their surroundings as props or to create sculptural headdresses and costuming. The artist is looking over their right shoulder with a commanding and watchful gaze, holding a mirror in their left hand so that the profile of the artist is visible in the reflection. Za – in isiZulu, the artist’s mother tongue – means ‘to know oneself’. For the artist, to know oneself is about self-representation – to see oneself and to be seen, to be reflected in the world, and to be visible.

Leigh Robb, Curator of Contemporary Art