Misheck MasamvuGods on Stilts, 2024
Misheck Masamvu’s practice is grounded in an expressive approach that channels the turbulence of lived experience into gestural, often chaotic compositions. Working chiefly in oil on canvas, he channels the contradictions of daily life into densely worked surfaces built from gestural brushwork, saturated colour, and purposeful disorder. These layered compositions register instability and ambiguity, yet they also insist on presence. Masamvu draws attention to political dysfunction and the consequences of failed economic policies while probing more existential questions. Sharp, occasionally disarming titles heighten the push and pull between humour and despair, clarity and confusion, mirroring the complexities of contemporary Zimbabwean experience.
New paintings produced during his 2024 residency at G.A.S. Foundation in Nigeria extended these concerns, deepening his engagement with psychological uncertainty and existential fragility. The canvases present tangled marks and shifting forms that refuse resolution, prompting viewers to consider the roles, responsibilities, and interdependencies that shape both communal and personal worlds. Masamvu’s work does not prescribe answers; it creates a space for reflection and conversation, where the human condition is felt as precarious, resilient, and always in motion.
