Khanyisile Mawhayi (b. 1998, Kagiso, South Africa) is an artist, writer, and curator whose multidisciplinary practice explores the aesthetic, cultural, and emotional resonances of colour.
Her early work focused on richly hued depictions of xibelani skirts, rendered in soft pastel on black grounds, that examined both their visual allure and their significance as markers of her Tsonga heritage. In her more recent series, Black and White Paradise, Mawhayi has broadened her chromatic vocabulary through the use of vivid oil sticks, engaging with the interplay between colour, memory, and sentiment. In this regard, she acknowledges affinities with colourists such as Howard Hodgkin, Chris Ofili, and Katharina Grosse.
Equally influential is Julie Mehretu, whose use of signs and gestures to map landscapes and urban environments resonates with Mawhayi’s own approach. While her works are abstracted rather than strictly abstract, they frequently draw meaning from process. This is exemplified by her Midas Touch series (2023), in which she applied a gold sticker daily over the course of one hundred days. Minimal in gesture yet cumulative in significance, the project framed each sticker as a “reward for the daily work of living.” Such process-driven methodologies, informed by references ranging from art history and literature to music, popular culture, and personal experience, underscore Mawhayi’s commitment to embracing multiplicity within her practice.
Mawhayi received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of the Witwatersrand in 2020. She is currently based in Cape Town, where she serves as Curatorial Assistant at the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa.
Her work has been the subject of two solo exhibitions: Midas Touch at CHURCH Projects, Cape Town (2023), and Stage at Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town (2021). She has also participated in numerous group exhibitions, including What We Know, Keyes Art Mile, Johannesburg (2023); STAGE 4, Stevenson Gallery @ The Vault, Cape Town (2023); Zozimo Bulbul Black Film Festival, Rio de Janeiro (2022); Afropolis, Johannesburg (2022); Repair, The Point of Order, Johannesburg (2022); Monotypes… A Monotype Babe Experience Curatorial, Bag Factory Studios, Johannesburg (2021); Watercolor… monotypes, August House, Johannesburg (2021); Bluet, KSSO Editions, Cape Town (2021); Get up! Stand up!, Kampala Biennale, Online Exhibition (2020); and also also also and and and, Institute for Creative Arts, Online Exhibition (2020).