Candice Breitz was born in Johannesburg in 1972. The Berlin-based artist has been a professor at the HBK Braunschweig since 2007. Her moving image installations have been shown internationally. Her work can be found in the collections of museums such as the Tate Modern, New York’s Museum of Modern Art,
Damon Galgut was born in Pretoria in 1963. He is considered one of South Africa’s most renowned authors. He made his debut at the age of seventeen with the publication of the novel »A Sinless Season« [1982], which tells the story of three young inmates at a reformatory. He achieved
born in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. The saxophonist, composer, arranger and bandleader was driven into exile by the Apartheid regime in 1984. He studied music at Rhodes University in South Africa and at the California Institute of Arts, Los Angeles. In 1988 he settled in Berlin, where he founded the
Zakes Mda , full name Zanemvula Kizito Gatyeni Mda, was born in Herschel, Eastern Cape, South Africa, in 1948. His father, Ashby P. Mda, was an anti-Apartheid activist, a founding member and president of the African National Congress (ANC) Youth League. In the 1960’s, his father was imprisoned and the
born in 1978 in Port Elizabeth (South Africa), is a documentary filmmaker and sociologist researching at the Institute for Humanities in Africa (HUMA) at the University of Cape Town. She was a visiting professor at Yale University and has received many grants, inter alia from the African Humanities Program, the
Sonwabiso Ngcowa was born in 1985 in the village of Mpozisa in the South African province of Eastern Cape, and grew up in the Masiphumelele township near Cape Town. He was one of the few youths there to graduate from high school and after studying business management he worked for
Sindiwe Magona was born in 1943 in Umtata (Transkei, South Africa) and grew up in Gugulethu in the Cape Flats near Cape Town. She did both her last two years of high school and her BA, from the University of South Africa, by correspondence. She then got a Masters degree
Sheila Kohler was born in Johannesburg in 1941 and grew up with violent impressions of South Africa under apartheid. The experiences of her childhood and youth shape her work to the present day. She has published three volumes of short stories, ten novels and a number of essays, and currently
Sanusha Naidu studied law and political science, and graduated with a special focus on international relations. She is a research director of the “China in Africa” project of the FAHAMU organisation, which investigates the effects of China’s political and economic involvement in Africa.
Piet Grobler, born in Nystroom in 1959, grew up in the province of Limpopo and is one of South Africa’s most significant picture book illustrators. After completing his theology studies he was a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church for five years. In the early nineties he turned to art,
Nadine Gordimer was born in the South African mining town of Springs in 1923. Gordimer, the daughter of Jewish immigrants, published her first story at the age of 15. She studied Humanities in Johannesburg but soon began to concentrate entirely on her writing. In 1949 she published her first collection of short
Mazisi Raymond Kunene was born in Durban, South Africa, in 1930. He graduated from the University of Natal with a paper on traditional and modern Zulu poetry. In 1959 he obtained a grant to complete his doctoral dissertation in London. From this point on Kunene dedicated himself to the struggle for
