Zolani Siphungela

The life of Zolani Siphungela and his family was shattered by the economic crisis during the covid lockdown in South Africa. Together with his wife and three young children he was forced to move out of the house in Mfuleni and to build a temporal structure from wood and corrugated sheets in the dunes close to the township.

As illegal settlement is prohibited, the police prompted him to remove the structures daily, until he painted the sheets in his unique style. Impressed by his style, the family was left to reside in the dunes. Instantly, many more families settled around Zolani’s structure and created the new township called ‚Covid‘.

For his Matchbox edition 2021 Zolani glues woven rice bag sheets or jute fabric onto timber boards. He selects the original printed segments of the bags and combines them with layers of spray paint, projecting the silhouettes of found objects from the neighborhood or cut outs onto the surface. Zolani creates interesting relationships between these layers, which tell the stories of life in ‚Covid‘.

all artworks: 18 × 18 cm
spray paint, rice bag or jute fabric on timber boards