Nomusa Makhubu

Art historian and artist, Cape Town and Grahamstown

Nomusa Makhubu is an associate professor of art history and visual culture at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art. Her research covers African popular culture, performance art, photography and political engagement in art and she has written essays on subjects ranging from representations of sexuality in the art of Nicholas Hlobo and Zanele Muholi to the reception of the film Black Panther in South Africa. Exhibitions she has co-curated include the group show ‘Fantastic’ at the Michaelis Gallery in 2015, and the South African pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2019. In 2013 she co-edited a special issue of the journal Third Text, titled ‘The Art of Change’.

Makhubu’s contributions to African studies have been recognised by the African Studies Association and with a fellowship at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard. Her photography-based artworks have been exhibited internationally and in 2014 she won the Prix du Studio national des arts contemporains, Le Fresnoy, at the Dak’art Biennale.

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