Kudzanai-Violet Hwami

Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner in 2016

Born in Gutu, Zimbabwe in 1993, Kudzanai-Violet Hwami and her family relocated to South Africa amid political turmoil when she was nine years old, and then to the United Kingdom at seventeen. These experiences of geographical dislocation and displacement play an important role in the artist’s development. However, Hwami’s body of work, although personal, is not constricted to a place or location; the artist’s thematic choice of identity and sexuality have a universal appeal, and challenges viewers who share similar or opposing worldviews.

The present lot was painted in 2016, the year Hwami graduated from Wimbledon College of Arts with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. That same year, she was awarded the Clyde & Co. Award and the Young Achiever of the Year Award at the Zimbabwean International Women’s Awards, as well as being shortlisted for Bloomberg New Contemporaries. Since then, the artist has seen a meteoric rise and recognition in a relatively short artistic career: in 2019, she became the youngest person ever to represent their country at the Venice Biennale when she showed at the Zimbabwe pavilion, and mounted her first institutional solo exhibition at Gasworks in London, UK. She is currently completing an MFA at the Ruskin School of Art at Oxford University and has recently joined the roster of artists represented by Victoria Miro Gallery, London, alongside the likes of Wangechi Mutu, Chris Ofili and Njideka Akunyili Crosby.