Southern Guild will exhibit for the first time at the 8th edition of the Investec Cape Town Art Fair (ICTAF), held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) from 14 to 16 February 2020. The Cape Town gallery will feature as a Special Project (Booth SP1) with a group of works that explore the interrelationship of art and design. Featured artists include Dokter and Misses, Justine Mahoney, Andile Dyalvane, Zizipho Poswa, Porky Hefer, Atang Tshikare, Otto du Plessis, Rich Mnisi, Dylan Lewis and Xandre Kriel.

Highlights include new works by Zizipho Poswa, specially commissioned for ICTAF 2020. An artist whose large-scale ceramic sculptures are highly in demand, Zizipho’s work was acquired by the Los Angeles County Museum of ART (LACMA) in 2019. Her ceramics are included in important private collections internationally and were featured in Deeper than Text, at the 1stdibs Gallery in Manhattan in 2019.

Showing in South Africa for the first time will be two large-scale sculptures by Andile Dyalvane in black clay and wenge wood, titled Nkcokocha (Mountain Peak) and Idladla (Grain Silo). Standing at a metre and a half tall, these are among the largest individual pieces he has ever made. One of South Africa’s most renowned ceramic artists, Andile has held residencies and exhibited widely internationally, including a 2016 solo at Friedman Benda gallery, which represents him in New York City.

A monumental bronze sculpture by Justine Mahoney, titled Venus, will form the booth’s centrepiece. Measuring over three metres tall, it depicts “a Venus of this age, broken apart and reassembled,” says the artist – part robot, part children’s toy and part Neo-Classical idealism. A smaller version of the sculpture is on display in Justine’s solo exhibition, titled Mage, running concurrently at Southern Guild gallery until 27 May 2020.

Internationally award-winning fashion designer Rich Mnisi will show his Nwa-Mulamula’s Chaise, an upholstered leather chair in homage to the memory of Rich’s late great-great-grand mother. With its rounded, sensual forms and imposing physicality, the piece takes its title from the central matriarch (“Nwa-Mulamula” means “guardian” in Xitsonga), whose teachings have lived on in his family generation after generation.

Since it was founded in 2008 by Trevyn and Julian McGowan, Southern Guild has challenged the boundaries between art and design. It has invited artists to incorporate functionality into their form-making and encouraged designers to produce one-off or limited-edition works, resulting in a rich cross-pollination between the two disciplines. The gallery has pioneered this movement on the continent, propelling its artists and designers to make original work that is distinctly African and globally relevant.

“Our dedication to this conceptual and formal dance between fields has manifested in a strong local and international curatorial programme that has shaped the world’s perceptions of African art, which historically has strong links to functional objects,” says Trevyn McGowan, co-founder of Southern Guild. “We have participated in the leading international fairs every year since 2011 so we are excited to add a local fair to our programme now, too.”