A Solo Exhibition by Lebogang Mogul Mabusela
4 May – 20 July 2024

Bag Factory Artists’ Studios is pleased to present iVum Vum, a solo exhibition by Lebogang ‘Mogul’ Mabusela, also known as Monotypebabe. The exhibition, consisting of monotype prints and drawings, unravels South Africa’s history with automotive culture.

Mabusela’s work exposes the hegemonies and precepts present in Black masculine culture and investigates its implications within contemporary South Africa. The exhibition features works from her ongoing series, ‘Johannesburg Words’, the title of which references an etching by Robert Hodgins by the name, ‘Joburg Words’.  The work depicts the city’s lively nature while satirising the elitism of its subjects – an approach Mabusela borrows to critique the pervasiveness of misogynoir amongst Black men.

Mabusela’s work employs levity to highlight the day-to-day encounters Black women have with men in the city, visualising the recurring linguistic exchanges during these experiences. She notes how the works’ sardonic nature: “contradicts the reality of navigating within misogynoir; a dangerous space filled with obstacles, sexist roadblocks and patriarchal potholes.” Mabusela turns the male gaze on its head and on itself, gesturing towards its persistence and dangerously unassuming nature. Centring men through portraiture coupled with text, the works illustrate the brash engagements Black women regularly face and illuminate the mechanisms men employ to disarm women, including vernacular language to connect to their localised experience. Displayed on shelves to emphasise their textuality and Mabusela’s role as storyteller: these scenes place the onlooker in her shoes while portraits act as mirrors, hoping to offer a moment of reflection and reckoning.

Mabusela continues this inquisition into masculinity in new works featured in iVum Vum, which unpack the relationship between men and their cars. The show’s title alludes to a song by Kwaito star Brown Dash of the same name. The song tells the tale of Brown Dash courting a woman by offering to take her on a ride to the movies in his car.

He uses some of the terms of “endearment” referenced in Mabusela’s works to personify the cars that men love as if they were a woman who had turned him smitten. Mabusela’s new series expounds upon this by showing how such personification of an object as woman, in turn, bolsters a culture in which women are objectified. Her spotlighting of the peacock green 1992 BMW E30 325is, more popularly known as the “Gusheshe” – a make and model notorious within South African car spinning, racing and automotive culture – asks viewers to interrogate the rift between popular culture and personal responsibility.

iVum Vum is a critique of gender roles within contemporary South Africa, and beyond, and how its actors attach themselves to hegemonic expressions of masculinity. The exhibition questions who is allowed to pursue pole position and who takes the last spot within the domain of car culture, and culture at large.

Lebogang Mabusela, YOH YOH YOH.  2024, Water Colour Monotype, 17 x 21cm. Image courtesy of the artist. 

Lebogang Mogul Mabusela born in Mabopane is a self-proclaimed Zinequeen and Monotypebabe currently practicing in Pretoria. In 2019 she graduated with a BA in Fine Arts from the Wits School of Arts, where she was awarded the Standard Bank Fine Arts Prize. Mabusela has participated in several group exhibitions in South Africa including art fairs: the Cape Town Art Fair The Latitudes Art Fair, David Krut Projects and Internationally in Lagos, Nigeria and Frieze London in the UK, in Paris at Gallery Esperance.

In 2019 was a Top 50 Design Indaba Emerging Creative. Mabusela had her first solo exhibition in 2022 titled Ukwatile? – A body of work about language, catcalling and voyeurism– at the Stevenson Gallery in Johannesburg as part of their STAGE program for artists not represented by a Gallery. Currently she runs a printmaking program called The MonotypebabeCuratorial. Mabusela’s residency participations include, The Young Womxn Studio Bursary in Joburg, Blvck Block Online residency and The Salzburger-Kunstverein in Austria. Recently she was shortlisted for the Norval Sovereign African Art Prize and showed work at the Norval Foundation in Cape Town.