Born in Mozambique, this pioneer of modern African art developed his unique painting style early in his career, an aesthetic defined by a dense assembly of figures; phantasmagoric depictions of animals, humans, and supernatural creatures; and a palette of both bright and dark colors. His work embodies the new artistic vocabularies that arose in Mozambique in tandem with the struggle for a liberated nation, much as they did in other parts of the African continent.

The Witch Doctor, or The Purification of the Child (O feiticeiro, ou A purificação da criança), 1962
Malangatana Ngwenya. Oberlin College Libraries, Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Lloyd H. Ellis Jr. in memory of Eduardo Chivambo Mondlane (OC 1953)
Though largely self-taught, Malangatana took painting classes in the late 1950s at the Industrial School and the Art Club of Mozambique—the latter a center of artistic activity in the capital Maputo (then Lourenço Marques). In this period, he became active in the cultural milieus of Maputo and found his first teachers and sponsors in artists and architects João Ayres, Augusto Cabral, and Pancho Guedes. While his first paintings show traces of the European modernism he encountered in his art education and through his mentors, Malangatana quickly established his own aesthetic. Simultaneously he honed his distinctive allegorical approach to depicting daily life in Mozambique, mixing symbols and motifs culled from his experience of local craft, Christianity, and the folklore of the culture he belonged to, the Ronga.

The Poet as a Child (O bebé poeta), 1963
Malangatana Ngwenya. Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Lloyd H. Ellis Jr. in memory of Eduardo Chivambo Mondlane (OC 1953), 2013.37
The changes in Mozambique’s political history during the 1960s and 1970s significantly impacted Malangatana’s life and work. A Portuguese colony until 1975, Mozambique was among the last African countries to gain independence from colonial rule. As the quest for liberation grew with the formation of the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) in 1962 and the armed resistance against the Portuguese in 1964, a strong anticolonial sentiment and a need for new artistic and cultural forms emerged. Malangatana had touched on social and political themes in earlier work, but from the mid-1960s through the 1970s he articulated them more explicitly, while always retaining an allegorical tendency in his approach.

PIDE’s Punishment Room (Sala de castigo da PIDE), 1965
Malangatana Ngwenya. Estate of Malangatana Valente Ngwenya
This presentation is both the first survey of Malangatana’s early work since his death and the first solo exhibition of a modern African painter at the Art Institute. Bringing together over 40 key paintings and drawings, the exhibition highlights the years between 1959 and 1975 as a period in which Malangatana embarked on bold formal experiments and painted the rapidly changing world around him, inviting us to consider his development as an artist part and parcel with the emergence of modern African art.

The Fountain of Blood (A fonte de sangue), 1961
Malangatana Ngwenya. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Lloyd H. Ellis Jr., 2012.67
Sponsors
Major funding for Malangatana: Mozambique Modern is provided by Sylvia Neil and Dan Fischel and the Alfred L. McDougal and Nancy Lauter McDougal Fund for Contemporary Art.
Additional support is contributed by the Society for Contemporary Art through the SCA Activation Fund and the Miriam U. Hoover Foundation.
Members of the Luminary Trust provide annual leadership support for the museum’s operations, including exhibition development, conservation and collection care, and educational programming. The Luminary Trust includes an anonymous donor; Neil Bluhm and the Bluhm Family Charitable Foundation; Jay Franke and David Herro; Karen Gray-Krehbiel and John Krehbiel, Jr.; Kenneth C. Griffin; Caryn and King Harris, The Harris Family Foundation; Josef and Margot Lakonishok; Robert M. and Diane v.S. Levy; Ann and Samuel M. Mencoff; Sylvia Neil and Dan Fischel; Anne and Chris Reyes; Cari and Michael J. Sacks; and the Earl and Brenda Shapiro Foundation.