PRESENTATION: Troy Makaza-Untwisting The Fantasy

Troy Makaza’ surreal works, woven from painted silicone strings, inhabit the space on both side of painting and sculpture, creating a threadlike spider web. His broader examination of the fluid and in-flux relationships between the sexes in contemporary Zimbabwe bound together powerful metaphors for social and intimate spaces, where traditional values and liberal attitudes are no longer assured.

By Efi MIchalarou
Photo: Galerie Poggi

Troy Makaza presents, “Untwisting The Fantasy”, his solo exhibition in France, a unique opportunity to introduce Zimbabwean contemporary art to the Parisian public. Born and raised in Harare, Troy Makaza is one of the most original Zimbabwean voices to emerge in the past decade. To merge his love of painting in sculpture he invented his own medium, creating seductively bright and tactile silicone infused with pigment surreal wall works, a material which can be cast, painted with as well as woven and tied. Having specialized in painting in art school but always interested in form and texture, Makaza decided to develop his own hybrid medium which would enable him to unite his artistic goals. After experimenting with various materials, Makaza arrived at silicone a material which can be cast, painted with as well as woven and tied. Over the past eight years Makaza’s works progressively developed as an opportunity to speak both viscerally and philosophically to the issues Makaza finds compelling as a young Zimbabwean concerned with politics, history and power and their impact on daily lives of ordinary people as well as a globally engaged millennial. Makaza sees his work as exploration and reconciliation of competing cultural, historical and political ideologies in Zimbabwe and globally. His works defy categorization, oscillating between weaving, sculpture and painting, physical and surreal, they compel visually and conceptually to shift our paradigm of engaging with the urgently contemporary in African art. Resonating with traditional modes like weaving and tapestry but unequivocally contemporary, Makaza’s works articulate the conversation of what African and uniquely Zimbabwean contemporary can be – a paradigm internationally engaging and locally compelling. Resonating with traditional modes like weaving and tapestry but unequivocally contemporary, Makaza’s works articulate the conversation of what African and uniquely Zimbabwean contemporary can be – a paradigm internationally engaging and locally compelling.

Photo: Troy Makaza Please see me !!!, 2023 Silicone infused with pigments , Silicone infused with pigments 180 x 125 x 3 cm, © Troy Makaza, Courtesy the artist and Galerie Poggi

Info: Galerie Poggi, 2 rue Beaubour, Paris, France, Duration: 1/3-15/4/2023, Days & Hours: The-Sat 11:00-19:00, https://galeriepoggi.com/