The Norval Sovereign African Art Prize 2022 Benefit Auction | Hosted by Sotheby’s

The Norval Sovereign African Art Prize 2022 Benefit Auction | Hosted by Sotheby’s

View full screen - View 1 of Lot 1. Visit From Ancestor III .

Cassi Namoda

Visit From Ancestor III

No reserve

No Reserves

Lot Closed

February 22, 05:01 PM GMT

Estimate

18,000 - 20,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Cassi Namoda

Mozambique

b.1988

Visit From Ancestor III


signed and dated 2021 (lower left)

oil on canvas

60 by 50cm., 23½ by 19¾in.

Please be aware of the Conditions of Sale when bidding. As a benefit auction, there is no buyer’s premium charged. The only additional costs due to the winning bidder are applicable sales tax and shipping. Works auctioned are sold “as is,” and condition reports are included with lot descriptions as available. In-person previews of the auction artwork will be available at Norval Foundation at 4 Steenberg Rd, Tokai, Cape Town, 7945, South Africa from 26 January – 22 February, Monday to Sundays 9 AM – 5:00 PM (Closed on Tuesdays). Please note that while this auction is hosted on Sothebys.com, it is being administered by Norval Foundation (“the museum”), and all post-sale matters (inclusive of invoicing and property pickup/shipment) will be handled by the museum. As such, Sotheby’s will share the contact details for the winning bidders with the museum so that they may be in touch directly post-sale.

This work has been kindly donated by the artist

Cassi Namoda (b. 1988, Mozambique) is an artist whose practice explores transience and transformation in Lusophone African life: the closeness of the spirit world, the trace of Portuguese settler colonialism, the psychic landscape of mixedness, the crucible of independence. Familiar motifs and subject matters – twinhood, religious patchwork, the ‘magic real – reflect a recurring interest in thresholds; in particular, the ways that regional knowledge map spiritual and temporal borders across the contours of the everyday.

 

Visit From Ancestor III shows a pink flamingo, no doubt in the midst of a great migratory journey far away from home, taking a short respite from flight to visit kin. Children cling to their mother's abdomen--her portly features forming the expressions of indelible maternal knowing at the sight of the traveling spirit. An observation of provincial life and culture, the painting explores themes of kinship, magic realism, the cadence of time, and the transcendence of colonial history. Namoda incorporates familiar conventions of colour blocking, classical composition, and figurative abstraction in rendering atmosphere and the African psychic landscape.