ABASIKATI: ‘This Woman’s Work’ – A Multisensory Tribute to African Women’s Resistance and Resilience
Mbombela – The Mbombela Art Gallery presents LABASIKATI: “This Woman’s Work”, a powerful mixed media exhibition.
The three-week exhibition, which opens next month on 9 May 2026, converges a lighting installation, photography, film & sound. Printmaking, text, sculpture, performance, and music.
As well as textile art with a strong sense of fashion design.
This work celebrates African women’s stories, their resistance, and their power – even unbeknownst to them.
Curated by Samkela Stamper, an independent curator, artist, writer, producer, and cultural activist with a Fine Art Degree from Rhodes University.
Stamper is pursuing a Master’s in Curatorial Studies.
LABASIKATI reads as a performative installation that explores the legacy of African women, drawing inspiration from the 1956 Women’s March and the country’s rich cultural heritage.
Stamper’s curatorial practice fuses fine art, performance, art in public spaces with notable successes at the National Art Festival and Michaelis Gallery at UCT.
Stamper was a Curatorial Fellow at UCT’s Institute for Creative Arts (ICA – 2022).
Her work has evolved from her roots as a talented poet and performer, representing Mpumalanga in festivals including Infecting The City Festival, Edinburgh Festivals, Afrovibes Festival in the UK, among others.
“Returning to Mpumalanga to showcase this work feels like a homecoming,” says Samkela Stamper.
“As a young artist almost two decades ago, this beautiful place of the rising sun and her people embraced me, loved me, and cheered me on, and now I’m paying homage to its role in shaping my journey.
“My curatorial practice is rooted in memory and archive, and LABASIKATI is a celebration of the stories that have made me who I am today.”
The exhibition pays tribute to pioneering South African artists like Mama Esther Mahlangu, Mama Gladys Mgudlandlu, Mama uMangqosini, and Mama Noria Mabasa, to mention a few, who used culture as a voice of resistance with such immense talent and pertinent work.
Working from their little big corners in the world.
Also across the seas, prolific artists and writers such as Faith Ringgold, Frida Kahlo, bell hooks, Maya Angelou, Audrey Lorde, and so many others.
Not to mention the extraordinary women who shaped and inspired me: my grandmother, my mother, my aunts, my sisters from other mothers, my women friends, women who wake up every day to make work and feed their families.
Women who make beautiful work with their hands and remain on the periphery. Women whose names we have forgotten. Women we remember and honour with this exhibition.
“LABASIKATI: ‘This Woman’s Work’ is about creating spaces for female artists to showcase their work and defying the politics of display,” says Stamper.
“We’re proud to feature emerging artists, including young designers and women who’ve never exhibited in a gallery before.”
Directed by Nontokozo Phiri, a talented thespian from Mpumalanga, who also coined the name LABASIKATI, the exhibition includes works by the curators themselves, with Lethabo Mashego’s poster design and short film featured alongside Phiri’s visionary direction.
Assistant curator Surprise Thabethe, who’s studying Fashion and Curating, also contributed to the exhibition’s development.
The show also incorporates “congregating over food”, referencing the 100 Flavours Exhibition at Maker’s Landing in Cape Town, 2020, where Stamper exhibited a ceramic pot during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Live performances and music will add to the vibrant atmosphere, making LABASIKATI a truly immersive experience.
LABASIKATI: “This Woman’s Work” runs from 9 – 31 May 2026
Walkabouts on 9, 10, 25, and 31 May 2026
The opening event starts at 4 pm on 9 May 2026
