Mustafa Maluka - "Either Love Me or Leave Me Alone"

Mustafa is taking the world by storm with shows in New York, Zurich, Graz, & Des Moines…

His most recent solo exhibition took place at Galerie Mikael Andersen, Berlin (2008). Recent and upcoming group exhibitions include Flow at the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York (2 April - 29 June 2008); World Histories at Des Moines Art Centre, Iowa (16 May - 31 August); and Common Affairs as part of the Steirischer Herbst festival in Graz, Austria (3-26 October 2008).

http://mustafamaluka.com/

UPCOMING SHOWS:

“FLOW”
Studio Museum Harlem
New York, USA
curated by Thelma Golden
April 2 to June 29
Trokon Nagbe, Olalekan B. Jeyifous, Mustafa Maluka, Nicholas Hlobo, etc.

“Youth Portraits”
Avanthay Contemporary
Zurich, Switzerland
curated by Thorsten Albertz
April 24 to May24
Qi Zhilong, Muntean/ Rosenblum, Mustafa Maluka, Aaron Romine, and Osang Gwon.

“World Histories”
Des Moines Art Center
May 16to August 31, 2008
El Anatsui (Ghana), Sonny Assu (Canada), Dario Escobar (Guatemala), Yoko Inoue (Japan),
Shi Jinsong (China), Mustafa Maluka (The Netherlands/South Africa), and Angela Strassheim (U.S.).

“Common Affairs”
steirischer herbst 2008
Graz, Austria
Landesmuseum Joanneum, Neutorgasse museum building
October 4 to 25, 2008
Ursula Biemann, Mladen Bizumic, Kristleifur BjÃ¶rnsson, Claus FÃ¶ttinger, Mustafa Maluka, Josephine Meckseper, Lily van der Stokker

(maluka [at] gmail.com).

[ Mustafa Maluka ]

Mustafa Maluka

With uncompromising allure, Mustafa Maluka’s large-scale oil paintings depict chic, imaginary subjects through vibrant color and textured shapes. Maluka grew up in Cape Flats — Cape Town’s apartheid-designated, non-white ghetto — and currently lives and works in both South Africa and Europe. After studying graphic design at the Peninsula Technikon, Maluka left his native country for de Ateliers, an independent artist institute in Amsterdam, where he first began to show internationally.

Aestheticizing a transnational and multicultural urban identity, Maluka draws from popular culture and hip-hop for his portraits. Neo-new-wave haircuts, graphic t-shirts, and geometric backdrops frame his sitters and add to their idiosyncratic identities. In Its true, we’re always looking out for one another, bubblegum-pink hair and angular patterns betray cartoon influences. Maluka’s signature striated faces and deadpan stares, seen in works like I can’t believe you think that of me and I’m alright, I feel good, evoke consumer culture with the look of weathered advertisements.

While loosely resembling Andy Warhol’s celebrity portraits, Maluka’s anonymous characters are his own invention. Culling imagery from fashion magazines and the mass media, Maluka imbues the everyday with a sense of heroism, eschewing the pedestrian in favor of a fierce sense of grandeur. The artist’s figures speak to the immigrant experience and recall the multicultural identity he formed as a youth in segregated South Africa.

Maluka’s peripatetic life as a DJ and the co-creator of Africanhiphop.com also bears influence on his visual art. With titles that reference song lyrics, his paintings testify to music’s capacity to disrupt borders and form connections between marginalized individuals around the world. - Thomas J. Lax

Mustafa Maluka’s work is currently on view in the group show Flow at New York’s Studio Museum in Harlem through June 29. His upcoming exhibitions include Youth Portraits at Avanthay Contemporary in Zurich, Switzerland, from April 24 to May 24 and Disguise: The art of attracting and deflecting attention at Michael Stevenson Gallery in Cape Town, South Africa, from May 15 to July 5.