The artist as messenger angel

‘I have always been haunted by dreams. There were times when I would dream of people screaming, crying and shouting but I then realised that these voices that are screaming in my dreams are the same noise I hear in my community, and around the world, where black people are hated and killed,” says Blessing Ngobeni, former Standard Bank Young Artist of the Year for visual arts.

He says the “noise” that comes through his artworks has an impact on those who are observers and visual thinkers. 

“It destroys us and suppresses us to a point where these screams appear in our works.”

His latest exhibition, titled Ntsumi Ya Vutomi, which means “angel of life” in Tsonga, on at Johannesburg’s Standard Bank Gallery, brings together paintings, video installations and sculptures — some new and some which he has showcased over the years. 

“This body of work is a collection of my memories and experiences as an artist — as I travel and meet people, as I read things on social media, and as I try to figure out what exactly makes sense to me. 

“That’s when I arrived at the point of titling the work Ntsumi Ya Vutomi because I feel like I am an angel who is carrying messages and my messaging is embedded in the work,”  Ngobeni says. 

As you walk into the Standard Bank Gallery, you are met with paintings that are so vocal, you can almost hear the screams and cries Ngobeni is talking about. 

Themes such as social injustice and self-enrichment, which are prevalent in post-apartheid South Africa, are visible in the textured artworks through notes of neo-expressionism and surrealism. 

“When a black person went into power, he did not decide to create his laws but instead continued to live under the laws of those that divided us. It becomes difficult for us to connect with the law because we are aware that some of the laws do not favour us or give us dignity,” he says.  

Ntsumi Ya Vutomi holds a mirror to some of the internal frustrations of black people. Freedom 

was fought for, yet only a few enjoy the fruits. 

One of the injustices that Ngobeni speaks about is spatial planning under apartheid which left black, coloured and Indian people in townships. 

The painting Skeletons at Work effectively depicts this. 

“It speaks about zombified black bodies that are programmed to be packed in a taxi every morning to go to work and go back home in another packed taxi, just like zombies. 

“So, now your life is stuck in that cycle that makes it seem normal to live in these modern-day concentration camps called townships,” he says. 

These conversations were dissected in the gallery as people were observing the artworks, all with their own perspectives, which is what Ngobeni had hoped for. 

He says his art does not provide answers, instead it fuels conversations and forces people to see themselves, where they are, and to actively do something about it, one artwork at a time. 

The colour red dominates in his work. I overheard one of the viewers saying, “The paintings are bleeding.” 

“The reference of pots and the colour red is like blood, it symbolises pain that makes us not think further than us resorting to killing each other, stealing from each other, and not having the energy to think positively and find ways of survival. So yes, the paintings are bleeding,” Ngobeni says. 

Ntsumi Ya Vutomi demonstrates Ngobeni’s need for social justice, for confrontation of the ills of the past, which affect the present and future.

The exhibition is moving and it invites introspection, which might bring up emotions that you might have forgotten about or chosen not to feel. 

“I want people to reflect on what they see, and if it makes a meaning to them or triggers something in them, I want them to look within themselves,” Ngobeni says. Ntsumi Ya Vutomi will run at the Standard Bank Gallery in Johannesburg until 16 September.