07 march 2023, Manuela Klerkx
Mostaff Muchawaya: 'You will find me in my paintings'
'Anyone standing in front of a relief work by Muchawaya feels the eternal return - and age-old truth mixed with the giddy pleasure of novelty. Despite being an African artist at a time when black portraiture was the norm, he has rejected the iconicity of the black body in the art world, in favour of a more psychic representation of being black, or more controversial, a more general, more inclusive - universal being.' — Ashraf Jamal
The paintings of Mostaff Muchawaya (b 1981, Zimbabwe) are the result of a search for self. By applying thick layers of paint, ink, paint chips and other residue from pre-existing paintings and by scraping away parts of the paint surface, Muchawaya creates landscapes and portraits that are inextricably linked to his childhood. They flow from memories of his people, his native region and, in particular, the special women in his immediate environment. Using a slow process of adding and removing, he creates faces, rivers and mountains. They take him back to the farm where his parents worked and to his upbringing in Zimbabwe's mountainous eastern highlands. Like a 'boy scout', he paints his way back to his childhood in search of his identity that is not limited to his own body and mind but is connected to his family, the place where he grew up, the women he loved. Not surprisingly, he experiences his paintings as a safe place, a refuge, in which he finds his original self again. Muchawaya: 'You will find me in my paintings.'
Mostaff Muchawaya, Self-portrait, 2017, Duende Art Projects
Mostaff Muchawaya's life as an artist began in 2012, when he joined the artist collective Village Unhu in Harare, Zimbabwe. This collaboration led, among other things, to the exhibition 'My Entire People and Places' that took place at the Old Mutual Theatre in Harare in 2013. A major milestone was the exhibition 'Five Bhobh - Painting at the End of an Era' in which twenty-nine artists from Zimbabwe, including Muchawaya, participated and which took place at the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary African Art in Cape Town (Zeitz MOCAA) in 2017. With his second solo exhibition called 'Zviso Zvangu - My Faces' at the SMAC Gallery, also in Cape Town, in 2018 and his participation in the 22nd Sydney Biennale in 2020, he established his name as one of the leading representatives of the youngest generation of African painters.
Mostaff Muchawaya, Mount Sharon near Nyazura, 2022, Duende Art Projects
Your solo exhibition at Duende Art Projects in Antwerp, early 2023, was also your first solo exhibition in Europe. How did this collaboration come about?
In 2022, the gallery presented some of my portraits in the group exhibition 'Unsettled'. The founder of Duende Art Projects, Bruno Claessens, had gotten to know my work through my participation in the expo at the Zeitz MOCAA in 2017 and contacted me via Instagram. At the exhibition in Antwerp, my latest paintings were very well received and several works were sold to important collectors. I was very satisfied with our collaboration and the mutual trust was confirmed when Bruno invited me for a solo exhibition in his gallery.
Were the works on display especially made for this expo? And can you tell us something about them?
I made a number of large-scale abstract landscapes especially for this exhibition. The monumentality of these landscapes really flourish on large canvases, which is why I was happy to show them here. I am also showing a series of new portraits - including those of my sister and my youngest nine-month-old daughter Chiedza - and an older portrait of my wife and me from 2017.
Mostaff Muchawaya, Chiedza, 2022, Duende Art Projects
When I was a kid, I often made toys out of clay. I also liked to draw. But my real inspiration was Nicole Sanderson, the daughter of the owners of the farm where we lived and whom I met when I was 12 years old. She was in boarding school but at weekends and during school holidays, she would come home and we would draw and paint together. After secondary school, in 2002 and 2003, I studied at the School of Visual Art in Zimbabwe where I graduated with Admire Kamudzengerere. In 2012, I joined ‘Village Unhu’, an artists' collective in Harare - where I still live. A career as an artist in Zimbabwe is not easy, but we support one another. Artists like Gareth Nyandoro, my uncle, and Misheck Masamvu, played an important role in my personal development as an artist.
Mostaff Muchawaya, Untitled landscape, 2022, Duende Art Projects
What do you consider most important as an artist?
My work is between figurative and abstract painting. The portraits and landscapes correspond to memories I have of my childhood, my native region. But although they always refer to reality, they are not immediately recognisable as such. I think it’s important the viewer can project his or her own story onto them.
Which artists inspire you?
I like to look at the old masters such as Rembrandt and Rubens. But I am not a copy cat. I want to develop my own visual language and, to do so, I look at techniques used by other artists. Not to copy them but to learn from them and understand how I can do things differently.
Can you say something about the creation process of your paintings or wall reliefs?
I usually work on four paintings at a time because my approach takes a lot of time. First I impregnate the canvases and then I apply at least four layers of paint. Between painting, all those layers have to dry. That process goes very slowly but in the meantime the painting 'tells' me what to do. And by continuing to look at them you find out. That takes time but you can't force anything. By looking and looking and looking again, at some point you see what the painting is asking for. And then I have to put that on canvas. That's the discovery you make: from within the painting, not from something outside of it. That is why a good artist cannot be a copy cat.
Mostaff Muchawaya, Rupako, 2022, Duende Art Projects
My background. I want to show who I am and where I come from. I want to bring to life memories of my childhood, my people and surroundings. Memories fade with time and get 'snowed under', so to speak, by new experiences. That is why I paint in thick layers and then remove parts of them with terpetin or by sanding. This is how I get to the original memory, to the core. The person I am. This peeling off is not only a spiritual but also an artistic process. I think a lot about my past because I had a difficult childhood. One of my paintings is called 'Zira', which means the road, the path. In fact, I paint the path to the places where I grew up.
Mostaff Muchawaya, Chimwanda mountain near Nyazura, 2022, Duende Art Projects
I see it as my destiny to tell my story through my paintings and to continue to do so until my death.
What is life like in Zimbabwe?
There are some tensions now because the elections are coming up, but generally speaking, life is pretty good here. I paint every day and I have four children. Two boys and two girls. So I am done... (laughs).
