ARTIST STATEMENT
I’m a mixed-media visual artist, with a focus on utilizing acrylics and charcoal to produce captivating works on paper and canvas. I view art as a powerful tool for storytelling, weaving narratives that resonate across cultures while drawing from my own heritage and personal experiences. My artistic approach involves a deliberate exploration of textures and forms on a variety of surfaces, blending abstract expressionism with direct representation to create compelling scenes that invite viewer interaction and interpretation.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Nduvho Mphidi, of the Mphidi-Madzivhandila clan, was born in 1997 in Johannesburg, South Africa, but grew up in the lush Limpopo province, also known as “Africa’s Eden.” He spent his early childhood in Venda (Vhembe region) and later moved to Polokwane during his primary school days, where he stayed until he completed his Matric. His love for art was notable from a young age, as he was fascinated by drawing cars and animation characters when he wasn’t playing hockey, cricket, or video games. His innate passion for drawing took form in his school subjects, namely Engineering Graphics and Design at high school level, where he excelled with distinctions and received awards for his meticulous work.
Nduvho (which means “Praises” in Tshivenda) is a self-taught, interdisciplinary artist who loves to explore when it comes to expressing himself through his creativity. This is evidenced in other artistic avenues, like the composition of deep house music, to using his pen to express his creative thoughts across the various platforms in the visual arts disciplines best suited to express his life experiences, ideologies, and emotions.
His focus and discipline are mainly in the visual arts, where he works with acrylics, charcoal, and mixed media on paper as well as canvas. He incorporates his Engineering Graphics and Design background into his work by employing the density and the weight of perpendicular cross-hatching techniques. The precise details and accuracy of the hatching allow him to accentuate distinction between shadows and highlights through a technique largely used in the technical drawing space to indicate different materials.
Art is a form of expression for him, and it is a visual representation of stories shared in ways that are relatable to people of different cultural and religious backgrounds, as he likes to casually say, “everyone can understand a picture, but not everyone can understand Tshivenda.”
