Ayanda Mabulu South African , b. 1981

Ayanda Mabulu  (b. 1981, King Williams Town Eastern Cape , South Africa.  lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.))  is a contemporary South African artist whose practice employs painting, performance, and mixed media to confront the enduring legacies of colonialism, apartheid, and global power structures. His work engages political iconography, historical figures, and the visual language of protest, positioning art as a site of critical confrontation and ethical inquiry.

Working primarily in painting, Mabulu draws on sources ranging from European art history and propaganda imagery to mass media and popular culture. Through satirical and often deliberately confrontational compositions, he interrogates racialised power, economic inequality, and the symbolic violence embedded within political and cultural institutions. His practice insists on discomfort as a necessary condition for critical reflection, resisting neutralisation within contemporary visual culture.

Mabulu came to international attention through a series of works and exhibitions in the early 2010s that placed him at the centre of public and institutional debates around censorship, freedom of expression, and the role of art in democratic societies. His work has since been presented widely in South Africa and internationally, including a major solo exhibition at the DuSable Museum of African American History, Chicago (2018), marking his first U.S. museum presentation, and subsequent solo exhibitions in Johannesburg, including The Healers (2022) and a significant survey at Everard Read Gallery (2023). His work has also featured in curated group exhibitions in South Africa and abroad.

Mabulu’s work is held in prominent public and private collections, including the Standard Bank Art Collection, the Spier Arts Trust, the Merchantec Capital Collection, the Leridon Collection (France), and the DuSable Museum of African American History. His practice has been the subject of sustained critical writing and media attention, situating him within broader global conversations on decolonisation, visual activism, and the ethics of representation. Through an uncompromising visual language, Mabulu continues to assert the urgency of politically engaged art in the contemporary moment.