Kudzanai ChiuraiThe Fear of Magic, 2020
Kudzanai Chiurai’s painting practice occupies a critical space between visual activism and speculative history, engaging directly with the ongoing legacies of colonialism, political authority, and cultural memory in contemporary Africa. Working primarily in oil and mixed media, Chiurai employs bold figuration, layered symbolism, and textural density to construct charged visual fields where power, identity, and resistance collide. His paintings often take on the aesthetic of protest posters or theatrical backdrops, drawing from traditions of political propaganda, street art, and classical portraiture to create compositions that are both confrontational and reflective.
At the core of Chiurai’s practice is an interrogation of how power is performed, memorialised, and disrupted. His use of allegory and constructed personas allows for a critical reimagining of historical narratives, particularly those surrounding masculinity, governance, and the postcolonial state. Theatrical and densely composed, his paintings evoke a sense of staged reality – one that questions the systems that shape collective memory and public imagination. In reframing dominant visual codes, Chiurai’s painting becomes a form of counter-history, offering a space in which alternative voices and visions of African futures can emerge.
