David Koloane Award - Bag Factory

2024 Award Recipient
Refilo Namise

We are pleased to introduce the 2024 David Koloane Award recipient, Refiloe Namise a Johannesburg-based artist who completed her MFA in Creative Research and Practice at the University of the Witwatersrand. Her work is multi-disciplinary, incorporating image, text, sound, video and performance.

Namise’s work explores the making and preserving of a place: Alexandra. Through various sites in Alex, her work re-members and re-articulates particular moments and histories. These engagements develop ways of writing, recording, storing and sharing social knowledge, heritage and culture.

Though much of these concerns are reflected in the present configurations of Alex, a deepened understanding of its existence as a place often demands a return to its past. Namise grapples with the notion of ‘return’, through poetic gestures in which she enacts/re-enacts certain historical moments.

This award has been made possible through the support of the
National Arts Council.