Artist Spotlight: Mohau Modisakeng

Mohu Modisakeng turned to art to relieve his emotional tensions. Drawing allowed him to deal with his feelings and experience dimensions of himself that were otherwise buried and voiceless. Today, art continues to be his lifelong passion and profession. Through film, large-scale photographic prints, installations and performances, his work explores the influence of South Africa’s violent history on today’s society. Mohau uses materials, metaphors and the black body as tools to uncover the truth behind our newly formed perceptions and understanding of our cultural, political, and social roles as people living in post-colonial Africa and in particular post-apartheid South Africa.

He completed his bachelor’s degree from the Michaelis School of Fine Art in 2009, and later graduated with his Masters in 2012 from the same institute. Despite his young age, Mohau’s work has exhibited in top galleries such as VOLTA New York (2013) and Saatchi Gallery, London (2012). South African history remains entrenched in his work, the tainted past and its effects supplying themes of segregation, oppression, and violence. Despite the political undertones in many of his pieces, Mohau works from a very personal place and his art is often symbolic.