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BILLY MANDINDI
Born 24th Februry 1967 in Cape Town, died 11th September 2005
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The following is an extract from “Resistance Art” by Sue Williamson

Asked if he thinks art can change the way people look at things, Mandindi replies: “If people would try to understand what the artist is trying to say, they can be like kids who are trying to grow.”

Mandindi is a student at the Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town, a young artist with a deep commitment to his work. “I’ll only do art in my life, nothing but art,” he says “work about people, and what’s happening. At first, when I was thinking about art, I thought it was about drawing and all those things…. Then I suddenly became aware of what was happening around me and tried to capture that.
In our art, I think there was something missing. It’s still missing. Some of the things that happened years ago, the results are still coming now, so in my work, I am trying to go far back and mix it with what is happening now.”
Mandindi not only depicts contemporary issues, but frequently makes work, which gives a fresh perspective to an historical event.

SCHOOLING

1979 -1994

(Standard 3-9) King Williams Town, Ciskei

ART EDUCATION

1990

Hard Ground Printmakers member: exhibitions: collaboration

1989
Thupelo Workshop Johannesburg

1988-1989
Visual Arts Group workshops: exhibitions: mural painting

1987-1988
Michaelis School of Fine Art; University of Cape Town

1985-1986
Community Arts Project Woodstock Cape Town CAP


EXHIBITIONS

2016
Impressions, group exhibition at The Cape Gallery

2015
Cities in motion, group exhibition at The Cape Gallery

2014
Telling our story; group exhibition at The Cape Gallery
Talking about Cape Town, group exhibition at The Cape Gallery

2012
Siyakubona, group exhibition at The Cape Gallery

2005
Participated in the Group Show “Encompass” at the Cape Gallery

1994
Picturing our World (Western Cape) S A National Gallery
Black and White, a relief print exhibition at The British Council, Athlone
Relief in Black and White, group print exhibition, Brighton University, UK
Fresh Cream, group exhibition of Print Making at the Chelsea Gallery, Wynberg
Exhibition of Linocuts S A Arts, Cape Town (September)
Participated in the Urban Arts Foundation Sculpture Workshop
Invited to participate in the Africus Biennale, Johannesburg
Commissioned by Caltex to produce two linocuts

1990
Participated in the MOMA Exhibition, London

1989
Visual Arts Group Exhibition, UCT Centre for African Studies
The above exhibition was taken to the University of the Western Cape

1988
Images of the Western Cape – S A National Gallery
Palette of Oppression – group exhibition with Rodger Meintjies and Fuad Adams

1987
Peep Show S A National Gallery, Cape Town
Eye of the Artist – Gugulethu Township: Cape Town Foreshore

1986
Student work C A P
Works on paper, S A Association of ARTS Durban
Young Blood, S A Association of ARTS Cape Town
Tin and Wire, S A National Gallery, Cape Town.


PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

UNISA Art Collection
S A A A Durban
S A National Gallery
Thupelo Workshop Art Collection
Caltex Art Collection

PUBLICATIONS
Youth Express, Grass Roots
Art of the South African Township, G Young
Resistance Art, Sue Williamson
Book of Hope, David Phillips Publishers
New Art, Jane Taylor, David Bunn
North Western University America.
Art in South Africa , the future present, written by Sue Williamson Ashraf Jamal , Published by David Philip Cape Town.

Billy Mandindi
View larger image
Artist: BILLY MANDINDI
Title: War and Peace 2/40
Size: 11 x 15 cm
Media: Linocut
Price on request

BELOW ARE excerpts FROM “SOUTH AFRICA THE FUTURE PRESENT” BY SUE WILLIAMSON AND ASHRAF JAMAL:
These are comments on Mandindi's artwork done on the theme of South Africa’s struggle for liberation:

“It was Mandindi’s use of primary colours and the makeshift execution that were striking. In spite of the grimness of the theme, Mandindi’s piece was not sombre or funereal. “I didn’t want to do something that was very serious. That’s why I used bright colours. So it’s not that scary. So people can still look at the work.” Mandindi’s rationale serves as a vital corrective. It opens up a much-needed realm of healing.

Mandindi’s art exists in the realm of imagination and not in the realm of the pictorial and strait-laced narrative,” says the artist Gavin Younge. “There is something ‘fantastical’ about him” It is this transformative and alchemical quality that distinguishes the artist and his painting, constructions and prints. Mandindi is a jester for whom nothing is to serious – and yet concerning the life of the South African Artist, he reminds us that “things are still the same”. He continues to regard himself as “a tool for the liberation”, but believes this tool need not be that of a sad militancy. After all “one does not kill by anger but by laughter” says Zarathustra. “Come, let us kill the spirit of Gravity”

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