PAIN, PAINT AND POSSIBILITIES

NOMAZA NONGQUNGA COUPEZ'S ART RESIDENCY PROGRAM FACILITATES PRACTICEFOCUSED VISITS TO THE SOUTH OF FRANCE FOR FEMALE SOUTH AFRICAN ARTISTS, RESULTING IN THEIR TRANSFORMATIVE EMPOWERMENT.

- Alastair Hagger

"God knew the African woman was going to have a very, very hard life," writes Sindiwe Magona in Beauty's Gift, her paean to the fierce sororal resilience of female survivors. "He gave her that tough, timeless skin so that her woes would not be written all over her face, so that her face would not be a map to her torn and tattered heart." This pain, and its healing, is instead charted in other ways; in South Africa, it is embedded in and articulated through the artistic expression of women who transform generational trauma into palliative innovation and creativity. To trace the journey of the artist Nthabiseng Boledi Kekana is to understand the ways in which South African women support and uplift one another; how female agency is liberated through opportunity and empowerment.

Kekana is a beneficiary of Undiscovered Canvas, an art agency "showcasing the best emerging talent from Africa and the diaspora". The agency is the brainchild of Nomaza Nongqunga Coupez, who identifies and evolves nascent ability through the Makwande Art Residency program, which facilitates practice-focused visits to the South of France for female, fledgling South African artists.

"As I was successfully growing the careers I represented, I realized there were very few female artists I was able to have on my roster," Nongqunqa Coupez says. "And it concerned me, because I realized I did not hear their voices; I was not able to tell what is happening within their communities. Emerging artists are very vulnerable; they don't have any form of support. We're losing a lot of critical voices from the African continent, especially from women."