Emafini by Lona Ndzimande | Mixed media on canvas | 110cm x 86cm.
LONA NDZIMANDE
LONA NDZIMANDE (b. 2000) lives and works in Cape Town. In 2023 she obtained a Diploma in Fine Arts at The Ruth Prowse School of Art in Cape Town.
Lona Ndzimande’s practice explores Black womanhood through the lens of her Zulu upbringing. Using mixed media – including acrylic, Zulu glass beads, fabric, pearls, papier mâché, and paper collage – she creates layered portraits that celebrate Blackness, femininity, and self-expression while interrogating societal expectations and purity culture.
Ndzimande’s work balances intimacy, defiance, and joy, incorporating textures, draped beads, and sculptural elements to highlight resilience, sensuality, and the complexity of identity. Through her bold visual language, she builds archives of Black femininity that honour tradition while engaging critically with contemporary life.
In her recent solo exhibition, What I Meant to Say, Ndzimande reflected on the silences imposed on Black women by tradition, purity culture, and society at large. Through portraiture and collage, she explored themes of vulnerability, resistance, autonomy, sensuality, and self-definition. The works reclaim agency within spaces that have historically sought to define and contain Black women, transforming what was restrained, softened, or left unspoken into bold declarations of identity and self-expression.
SOLO & GROUP EXHIBITIONS:
2026 Reframing the visibility, Eclectica Contemporary, Cape Town
2026 WHAT I MEANT TO SAY, WORLDART, Cape Town
ART FAIRS:
FNB Art Joburg 2026
RMB Latitudes Art Fair 2026
2026 Investec Cape Town Art Fair