SEBAKA: Reflections on Communal Spaces

The word Sebaka translates broadly as place, space, location, or territory. Beyond geography, however, Sebaka speaks to belonging, to where we gather, where we remember, where we celebrate, and where we become part of something larger than ourselves.

Across Africa, communal spaces have historically served as sites of learning, ritual, storytelling, healing, celebration, and cultural transmission. Beneath a tree, around a fire, in a family courtyard, at a place of worship, during ceremonies, or within neighbourhood streets, these spaces have sustained generations through shared responsibility and collective care.

At the heart of these spaces is the spirit of Isintu, an understanding of our humanity as something realised through our relationships with others.

Yet the spaces through which communities connect are changing. Urbanisation, migration, technological shifts and evolving cultural practices continue to reshape how people gather, interact and remember. Some traditions endure, while others risk becoming distant from everyday life.

SEBAKA: Reflections on Communal Spaces emerges from this moment of change.

Bringing together artists working across painting, mixed media, abstraction and multidisciplinary practices, the exhibition considers communal life as both a physical and spiritual experience. The participating artists reflect on identity, ancestral memory, cultural inheritance, ritual, imagination and belonging, exploring how these ideas are carried through the spaces we inhabit and share.

The exhibition invites audiences to consider the role communal spaces continue to play in contemporary South African Black life and to reflect on what is preserved, what is changing, and what can be reimagined for future generations.

Ultimately, SEBAKA is an invitation to gather, remember and imagine together.

EXHIBITING ARTISTS:

Funeka Shupping

Scelo Mdladla

Lesedi Ramushu

Refiloe Mnisi

Katlego Ya Modimo

Senzo Shabangu

Andile Bhala