Home › Authors › Senzeni Marasela
Senzeni Marasela Quotes
born 1977 South Africa
Senzeni Marasela (born 11 February 1977) is a South African visual artist born in Thokoza who works across different media, combining performance, photography, video, prints, textiles, and embroidery in mixed-media installations. She obtained a BA in Fine Arts at the Wits School of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in 1998.
Random Senzeni Marasela quote
40 quotes
The Winnie Mandela that we receive through the book is through the system of patriarchy that at once rejected her and at times lauded her
Women older than us weren’t able to have these opportunities to speak and consider how to claim Black female subjectivities and identities
It’s also very difficult to be an artist in Africa. There is nowhere near enough patronage or understanding of what we do on the continent
Women are so accustomed to being sexually available
Colonialism and patriarchy still lingers
I am interested in how far I can push limits and eventually provoke people to interact with me
I realised that my life’s work would be to tell stories from the perspective of a Black woman
So when I see collections describing themselves as “global,” but someone like me isn’t there, I have to ask: why?
Knowledge about healing the body, treating illness, and caring for childbirth was gradually lost
I realised that fabric or things that we wear are historical documents because they carry so much information
I notice that where I work currently, there is a visible struggle with how I look
Performance is important to me. I like to insert myself into situations
One has a lot of difficulty trying to understand why being in the city centre should be so brutal for black women, why even the edges of the shops are occupied by these aggressive men who are out to police the behaviour of women and what they wear
African artists have far more opportunities for travelling and sharing than artists fifty years ago did
I grew up in a place where access to information was very limited and the country suffered from heavy censorship
Women in African society who have been revered have assumed roles men cannot, and then it is OK for them to be put on a pedestal
Africa has always been a dynamic energy, it has just never had the opportunity to write its history and define itself.It first needs to define itself without the negations and burdens of English and French Colonialism. Then it can become a new entity.
We should know more about each other’s work as African Artists than we do about European and American ar
We are still walking on very new terrain as Black women in this country, and I hope that the next generation carries on in this tradition
Even though back then I didn't know what would happen, I understood that this is what I would like to do the rest of my life – be a storyteller
Topics Senzeni Marasela is quoted on