Tell us a bit about yourself?
I am Muofhe Manavhela, I am 21 years old. I live in Johannesburg and I am based in Johannesburg. I am a Fine Arts student at Wits University. I am very big into art, beyond making it I love reading about it. I love art history, I love buying it although I cannot afford it yet. I like the idea of buying and collecting art. I love observing and looking at art, I am very much into art and the art space, beyond that some of my hobbies include cooking, yeah that’s just about it those are my main two passions.
What do you love most about being an artist, also which type of mediums do you use to create your art?
The thing I like the most about being an artist, is the freedom of it. I feel that like there’s with freedom of expression and just like where we find ourselves in the world today, there’s a lot space for people to articulate how they feel and to be open about their emotions, their thoughts and their opinions as well as we learn they are opinionated well. The thing I really like about being an artist is the fact that I can take these things, these concepts, these systems, everything that we have written down in words, documented in history but with no visual representation and I can start to take these stories and try to depict them as accurately as possible and as honest as possible. I love the fact that artists take things and they bring them to life literally like magicians, artists create visuals, that’s my favourite part about being an artist, the fact that I can create something visual for people to enjoy especially because I am such a visual person. I love looking at things, I love colour, I love having things excite my eyes, and I love that I can create that for other people. Another thing I love about being an artist is the fact there’s a lot of influence, like if you choose your language right, your visual language, if you choose your composition, your colours and what you put in your subject matter and your title. If you take time to pick that you can be a very influential person and you can relay a very strong message and it’s a very, very compact way to get something out in my opinion at least.
Which type of medium do I use to create my art? I am the kind of person that doesn’t like to conform to a specific medium. I try everything literally, I’ve tried painting, print making, embroidery, ink, pen, pencil, like everything. I really love opening myself up to new mediums because I don’t like, well my practice basically is based on the fact that I feel like different messages require different mediums and sometimes a painting is what I need to relay a message with a certain colour. Sometimes print making is what I use because I need that contrast, sometimes charcoals, sometimes embroidery really depends on the message but I will say that I do have a favourite and that’s painting by far. I love painting, I love colour, like I said earlier I am a colour person so like the fact I can play around with so many different colours, mix and match, colour pallets. I love colour pallets because I can create my own colour pallets through these visuals, that’s exactly why I love painting. Another favourite of mine is print making because I feel like print making holds a lot of weight I feel that there’s a lot of meaning in the way that you can relay messages with print making.
What is the vision, philosophy of your art work?
My practice is very based on my experience, my personal experience, my personal thoughts, my personal opinion. Art for me has always been something I run to, something I do on the side you know. I never really had time to address anyone else’s issues but my own. I used it as a way to get out of my head and so in trying to be a practising artist I still try to maintain that same principle, that same philosophy that is based on my experience because there’s no one that knows my story more than myself and there’s no one that can tell my story better than I can. Once you start to tell your own story, you start to realise that there’s a universal language of how we are raised, of how we think and how our practices are and for me showing my work, my life, my personality, people can come resonate but I think it’s the honesty that comes with me doing it, to my story because you know I am obviously going to tell the truth about my story yeah I think that is what really gets to people. So the vision, philosophy of my art in short is taking my own experience and trying to relate it with other black women.
You have been an artist for a while now what have been the highest and the lowest moments as an artist?
I’ve been an artist for a while yes. I’ve been doing art for a while but I haven’t been doing it full time it’s always been a side thing. I’ve been a full time practising artist for the past seven months now and in these seven months the highest moments are always the exhibitions. The opportunity for other people to get to view my art especially because of covid you know I feel like covid-19 took away that preciousness of being able to go to the gallery and look at someone’s art, so definitely a high this past year has been exhibitions. Lowest moments, I have two; being an artist full time and part time. Lowest moment being a full time artist is definitely when working part time. It’s the sacrifice so like you don’t have a lot of time, so with the time that you do have, it is like do what you have to do and so there’s always these ideas that are sitting at the back of your mind that never get the chance to be explored and it feels like wasted potential, wasted potential is very heart-breaking, so there’s not being given the opportunity or being afforded time or chance to explore everything you want to explore that was a low when I wasn’t working full-time.
With working full-time the lowest is being or trying to be an adaptive artist like I definitely want to honour myself and honour my experience and honour where I come from but I also want to challenge myself and try new things and push myself. Listen to people, listen to industry people and interact with industry people, see what other people are doing, understand what’s right and understand what’s wrong, basically try to see art as something professional because it’s my job now. It’s a business and it’s been definitely hard this year because you know when you have a passion for something, that line between passion and business is very emotional to cross because you need to sacrifice somethings for the benefit of the business and you have to sacrifice somethings for the benefit of your passion. So try to find that balance is a very hard journey. I would say that has been the lowest but definitely an experience I don’t take for granted, I feel like it teaches me a lot about myself, the practice and everything.
Where do you get your inspiration from?
I get a lot of my inspiration from the environment around me, I’m the kind of person who has their phone with all the time and can easily take the phone out of their pocket to snap a quick picture while taking a walk, or while in someone’s house or in the middle of nowhere, in the car or whatever, I look a lot outside, I look a lot at the environment around me and I capture it even if it’s not with my phone, even if I’m sketching it or taking a mental picture I definitely get a lot of inspiration from what I’m see around me. I’m also the kind of person that watches people as well, I get a lot of inspiration from watching how people interact in the world, what kind of people there are, I love the fact that we coexist as humans and as much as there are different people every day you see different faces, and we meet different characters and different cultures with different history. In different environments I love that personally I love the diversity the world has to offer, I take various inspirations from that also I take inspiration from myself and the experiences I go through in context to the people around me such as my friends, my black girlfriends mostly I look a lot to them I look a lot to my experiences I look a lot to how that works for me and in the world. I’m just a very observant person I really take inspiration from anything that’s around me. It’s a lot picking certain things from certain places from certain people like an outfit on one person, or a way another person speaks or thinks, maybe a lamp in someone’s house or a tree on the other side of the highway or the way two buildings are in the middle of nowhere it really can be anything. Where ever I’ve been as a person, a human, there’s definitely something I’ve taken inspiration from it.
Where do you see yourself in the next few years?
I would like to say that in the next few years my practice is definitely going to be more mature beyond being an artist I feel like I have a lot to contribute as well to the art industry as a business woman as well as an entrepreneur. I feel like the next few years people can expect to see me in a lot more conversational places, where things are being spoken about. In a lot more business spaces where the art industry is involved in a lot of art spaces where art is involved because I’m growing both as an artist and as business woman. Hopefully I also have a place where I can show case my art work, my own gallery, I’m putting this out to the universe hoping they happen.
Are you currently showcasing, where can people see more of your work?
Yes, there are a few exhibitions coming along towards the end of the year. I think the central place for people to go is my website and on instagram. My website is www.ememyear.com, the instagram page is also EMEMYEAR and my personal instagram is @muofhemanavhela. People can get a lot information from those three places that’s where I put a lot of the communication, where everything goes through first.
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