ASIA: Go Tsamaya Ke Go Bona
According to the artist, Themba Msiza, ASIA is an acronym denoting “An so is Africa”, a term he borrowed from Mo Molemi third album. The term emerges from the musician’s lyrical enunciations of his experiences during a journey that took him through our nine African states. In his first solo exhibition, Asia: Go Tsamaya ke go Bona, Msiza paid homage to Mo Molemi’s album through 12 panels that articulated, in turn, his experience and understanding of Mo Molemi’s musical offering. The body of work submitted for the exhibition are offshoots from one of Msiza’s earlier panel paintings entitled “How close we are”, featured in the For Sale Project Group Exhibition 2013, held at the Pretoria Art Museum. The panels featured in Asia, rendered by a fluid and assured hand, observed the treatment of African foreign nationals in South Africa.
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ASIA: Go Tsamaya ke go Bona reflected on the perpetual growth of regret, nostalgia, grief and joy that African foreign are confronted with in our country. Its portrait of how South Africans are detached from the rest of our continent and the experiences of foreign nationals South Africa.
This exhibition was curated by the For Sale Project Exhibition strategic team: Olwethu De Vos and Shimane Seemise.
12 February 2019
Reference credit
+All images featured on this site have been used with permission of the artist and may not be re-used without consent of the artist.
++The audio version of this interview, encountered in version Irie Ambient20XXI.eD.#1 remains the property of Mmutle Arthur Kgokong except where his name appears alongside that of a featured artist or artists.
*The body text of this feature has been reworked from the exhibition’s tablet information within the exhibition layout in the Henry Preiss Gallery, the Pretoria Art Museum, during the run of the exhibition.
To reference this text & audio documentation please cite:
Kgokong, M.A. 2021. Intraparadox, An Interview with Themba Msiza, Asia: Go Tsamaya Ke Go Bona. 22 February 2019. Irie Ambient20XXI.eD.#1. Mmutleak.com-Intraparadox. https://mmutleak.com/2021/05/14/intraparadox-an-interview-with-themba-msiza/
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Intraparadox 