By Mbali Tanana
Two Rhodes University Fine Art students have walked away with a merit award and R10 000 in prize money at the annual Sasol New Signature competition.
The opportunity drew interest from 903 artists who made submissions from eight collection points across the country. The entries were shortlisted to 106 finalists and ultimately saw Fine Art Master’s candidate Snelihle Asanda Maphumulo and fourth year Bachelor of Fine Art student Sarah Volker among the final top seven contestants.
Winners were announced recently at the Pretoria Art Museum where their work will be exhibited for the next few weeks.
Layered conversation
The Durban-born Maphumulo, who was a finalist in the competition last year, again submitted a piece that focused on her Zulu tradition. Her artistic practice engages with the deep, often complex terrain of Zulu tradition, and Christian faith. Maphumulo draws on personal and collective memory, allowing her work to become a layered conversation between heritage, belief, and belonging. Working with materials that carry symbolic and tactile weight, such as cow hide, sheep hide and found objects, she creates works that express her interest in texture, surface, and materiality, using touch as a form of testimony.
“I am honoured to be in the top seven of the competition again this year and even though I was in it last year, the competition never fails to surprise me. It has been a very humbling experience and I am so grateful for the opportunity that Sasol New Signatures affords us as artists to keep getting our work out there and to be in the room with industry experts has been phenomenal,” Maphumulo told Grocott’s Mail.
“What was mind blowing for me was watching people connecting with the work I had submitted. It was also reaffirming connecting with another artist who shared the same faith as me. This was encouraging and it validated the way I create,” Maphumulo said.
Ballet pain
East London-born Volker said she was shocked to be among the top seven in her first attempt of the competition. “I was really stunned when they called out my name. To be a finalist alone is such an achievement, but to be in the top seven was surreal. To be recognised among such talented artists, and to know my work really resonated, meant so much to me. It has been quite an overwhelming experience, ” she said.
“The competition has often been the talk of our department and school and some of my peers had previously applied and some were also applying this year, so I thought I’d try my luck as well,” said Volker.
Her work, entitled Taut, tethered and torn, focuses on the psychology of a ballet dancer. Her practice is rooted in sculpture and installation, often incorporating altered found objects, dance paraphernalia, and bodily residue. In documenting both vulnerability and endurance, Volker engages with material tensions such as weight and lightness, softness and abrasion, as she explores the wear and tear of the dancer’s body and its tools. She draws influence from Janine Antoni and is inspired by the body’s capacity to hold, express,
and conceal pain.
The 35th Sasol New Signatures exhibition is at the Pretoria Art Museum until 2 November 2025. The exhibition can also be viewed virtually via https://www.sasolsignatures.co.za/
