Malangatana Valente Ngwenya (6 June 1936 – 5 January 2011) was a Mozambican painter and

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems ( oral or wri ...

. He frequently exhibited work under his first name alone, as Malangatana. He died on 5 January 2011 in Matosinhos,

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

Life

Born in Matalana, a village in the south of

Portuguese Mozambique Portuguese Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique) or Portuguese East Africa (''África Oriental Portuguesa'') were the common terms by which Mozambique was designated during the period in which it was a Portuguese colony. Portuguese Mozambique originally ...

, Ngwenya spent his early life attending mission

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes comp ...

s and helping his mother on the farm. At the age of 12 he went to the city of Lourenço Marques (now

Maputo Maputo (), formerly named Lourenço Marques until 1976, is the capital, and largest city of Mozambique. Located near the southern end of the country, it is within of the borders with Eswatini and South Africa. The city has a population of 1,0 ...

) to find work, becoming

ball boy Ball boys and ball girls, also known as ball kids are individuals, usually human youths but sometimes dogs, who retrieve and supply balls for players or officials in sports such as association football, American football, bandy, cricket, tenn ...

for a tennis club in 1953. This allowed him to resume his education, and he took night classes, through which he developed an interest in art. He was encouraged by Augusto Cabral, a member of the tennis club, who gave him materials and helped him to sell his art, and also by

Pancho Guedes Amâncio d'Alpoim Miranda "Pancho" Guedes (Lisbon, Portugal, 13 May 1925 – Graaff-Reinet, South Africa, 7 November 2015) was a Portuguese architect, sculptor and painter an educator. He is described as one of the earliest post-modernist ar ...

, another member of the tennis club. In 1958 Ngwenya attended some functions of Nucleo de Arte, a local artists' organization, and received support from the painter Ze Julio. The next year Ngwenya exhibited publicly for the first time, as part of a group show; two years later came his first solo exhibition, at the age of 25. In 1963 some of his poetry was published in the literary magazine ''

Black Orpheus ''Black Orpheus'' ( Portuguese: ''Orfeu Negro'' ) is a 1959 romantic tragedy film made in Brazil by French director Marcel Camus and starring Marpessa Dawn and Breno Mello. It is based on the play ''Orfeu da Conceição'' by Vinicius de Mora ...

'', and his work was included in the anthology '' Modern Poetry from Africa''. In 1964, Ngwenya, who had joined the nationalistic

FRELIMO FRELIMO (; from the Portuguese , ) is a democratic socialist political party in Mozambique. It is the dominant party in Mozambique and has won a majority of the seats in the Assembly of the Republic in every election since the country's firs ...

guerrilla, was detained by the

PIDE The International and State Defense Police ( pt, Polícia Internacional e de Defesa do Estado; PIDE) was a Portuguese security agency that existed during the '' Estado Novo'' regime of António de Oliveira Salazar. Formally, the main roles of th ...

, the Portuguese

secret police Secret police (or political police) are intelligence, security or police agencies that engage in covert operations against a government's political, religious, or social opponents and dissidents. Secret police organizations are characteristic of ...

of the Estado Novo regime, and spent 18 months in jail. He was given a grant from the Lisbon-based

Gulbenkian Foundation The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation ( pt, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian), commonly referred to simply as the Gulbenkian Foundation, is a Portuguese institution dedicated to the promotion of the arts, philanthropy, science, and education. One o ...

in 1971, and studied

engraving Engraving is the practice of incising a design onto a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an in ...

and

ceramics A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcelain ...

in Portugal, Europe. Back to Mozambique, Africa, his art was exhibited several times in both Lourenço Marques and Lisbon until Independence. After the independence of Mozambique, due to the events of the Carnation Revolution of April 1974, Ngwenya openly rejoined FRELIMO, now the single-party communist organization that was ruling the new country, and worked in political mobilization events and alphabetization campaigns. In 1979 he participated in the exhibition ''

Moderne Kunst aus Afrika Moderne may refer to: * Moderne architecture, styles of architecture popular from 1925–1940s * PWA Moderne, an architectural style in the U.S., 1933–1944 * Streamline Moderne, a branch of Art Deco architecture which peaked in popularity arou ...

'', which was organised in

West Berlin West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...

as part of the program of the first Horizonte - Festival der Weltkulturen. After 1981 he worked full-time as an artist. His work was shown throughout Africa, and is in the collection of the

National Museum of African Art The National Museum of African Art is the Smithsonian Institution's African art museum, located on the National Mall of the United States capital. Its collections include 9,000 works of traditional and contemporary African art from both Sub-S ...

Washington, DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan ...

. In addition, he executed numerous

mural A mural is any piece of graphic artwork that is painted or applied directly to a wall, ceiling or other permanent substrate. Mural techniques include fresco, mosaic, graffiti and marouflage. Word mural in art The word ''mural'' is a Spani ...

s, including for FRELIMO and

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

. A large mural by him decorated the stairwell of the original building housing the

Africa Centre, London The Africa Centre, London was founded in 1964 at 38 King Street, Covent Garden, where over the years it held many art exhibitions, conferences, lectures, and a variety of cultural events, as well as housing a gallery, meeting halls, restaurant, b ...

, in King Street, Covent Garden. The mural was installed in the new premises of the Africa Centre, opened in Southwark in June 2022. Ngwenya also helped to start a number of cultural institutions in Mozambique, and was a founder of the Mozambican Peace Movement. He was awarded the

Nachingwea Medal The Nachingwea Medal is a medal awarded by the government of Mozambique in recognition of extraordinary merit. It is named after the southern Tanzania town of Nachingwea, which was the main base of Frelimo during the Mozambican War of Independenc ...

for his Contribution to Mozambican Culture, and was made a Grande Oficial da

Ordem do Infante D. Henrique The Order of Prince Henry ( pt, Ordem do Infante Dom Henrique) is a Portuguese order of knighthood created on 2 June 1960, to commemorate the quincentenary of the death of the Portuguese prince Henry the Navigator, one of the main initiators of ...

. In 1997 he was named a UNESCO Artist for Peace"African artist Malangatana dies"
BBC News, 5 January 2011. and received a Prince Claus Award. He was awarded a degree honoris causa by the

University of Évora The University of Évora (''Universidade de Évora'') is a public university in Évora, Portugal. It is the second oldest university in the country, established in 1559 by the cardinal Henry, and receiving University status in April of the same ...

in 2010. He died at the age of 74, on 5 January 2011 in Matosinhos, northern Portugal, after a long illness.

References

External links

* Hendrik Folkerts, Felicia Mings, and Constantine Petridis, eds. '' Malangatana: Mozambique Modern—The Modern Series at the Art Institute of Chicago''. Art Institute of Chicago, 2021. https://doi.org/10.53269/9780865593138
Photo portrait of Malangatana
"Duncan Campbell's Maputo photo diary", ''The Guardian'', February 2005.
Malangatana Mural for the Center for African Studies
Eduardo Mondlane University. * Alda Costa
"Arte e Artistas em Moçambique: falam diferentes gerações e modernidades (Parte 1)"
, ''BUALA'', 11 January 2012.
African Contemporary , Art Gallery

"Malangatana Ngwenya"
at Tate. {{DEFAULTSORT:Ngwenya, Malangatana 1936 births 2011 deaths 20th-century Mozambican painters 21st-century Mozambican painters Mozambican sculptors Recipients of the Nachingwea Medal

Life

References

Further reading

External links