SELECTED GROUP SHOWS
2024
AFRONOVA GALLERY at Latitudes Art Fair, Johannesburg, South Africa
2023
AFRONOVA GALLERY at AKAA, Paris, France
Looking for the Light, Photometria awards 2022, esp+ Gallery, Greece
2022
Uhambo, Umhlabathi Photo Collective, Johannesburg, South Africa
2021 – 2022
Inganekwane, Constitution Hill, Johannesburg , South Africa – Northwest University
Gallery, Potchestroom, South Africa
2021
Elective Affinities, Bristol Photo Festival, BPF Public Gallery, Bristol, UK
2020
Of Soul and Joy, Croisière, Arles, France
Rubis Mecenat at Investec Cape Town Art Fair, Cape Town, South Africa
2018
Place of Peace, organised by Rubis Mécénat, Stop Sign Art Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa
2017
AFROTOPIA, The 11th Edition of the Bamako Encounters,Bamako, Mali
Roadhouse, Casa Blanca Roadhouse, Brakpan, South Africa
2016
Free from my Happiness, organised by Rubis Mécénat, Johannesburg Art Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa
2015
Free from my Happiness, organised by Rubis Mécénat and curated by Tjorven Bruyneel and Bieke Depoorter, International Photo Festival, Ghent, Belgium
2014
Visions of Africa, Addis Abeba, Ethiopia
2013
In Thokoza, organised by Rubis Mécénat, Ithuba Art Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa
RESIDENCIES
2025
La Junqueira, Lisbon, Portugal
2024
Cité internationale des arts x IF, Paris, France
2022
NOOR Photo Agency, Amsterdam, The Nederlands
Akaa expose l’art contemporain africain dans sa diversité, Le Point, October 2023
SA artist shines at Paris’s AKAA Art and Design Fair, African Insider, October 2023
Young Photographer brings Thokoza to the World, Wanted Online, October 2023
uHambo: 10 years of Soul and Joy, The Mail and Guardian, February 2023
Young South African snapper Sibusiso Bheka graces Amsterdam, The Mail and Guardian, October 2022
Rubis Mécénat’s Of Soul and Joy South African Photography Project in Arles, whitewall, August 2020
Of Soul and Joy, fisheye magazine, July 2020
Of Soul and Joy Photography Project South Africa, Contemporary &, July 2020
Of Soul and Joy : Rubis Mécénat expose à Arles, artsixMix, June 2020
Sawubona Sibusiso Bheka !, clicanoo, April 2020
South Africa’s longest running Independent Art Fair returns for its 12th edition, Art Africa, November 2019
Shortlist CAP Contemporary African Photography Price announced, Zam Magazine, May 2019
Look: SA Youth tell their stories through the lens, IOL, July 2018
Rencontres de Bamako: Afrotopia, nouveaux imaginaires de l’Afrique contemporaine, France Info, December 2017
Photographie – Ouverture des Rencontres de Bamako : « Réinvestir les imaginaires », Jeune Afrique, December 2017
Bamako : à la 11e Biennale, les photographes imaginent le futur de l’Afrique, France Info, November 2017
An Outdoor Photography Exhibition Celebrates the Night in Johannesburg, Widewalls, August 2017
Brakpan roadhouse turned art gallery puts the real East Rand on show, Sunday Times, March 2017
At night, they walk with me: Sibusiso Bheka captures the atmosphere of Thokoza after dark, Between 10 and 5, October 2015
OF SOUL AND JOY, 10 YEARS
English
Published by Rubis Mecenat
2022
CATALYST 2020/2021
English
Published by IC Visual Lab in collaboration with Bristol Photo Festival
2021
AFROTOPIA
French and English
Published by Dilecta Editions
2018
THE OF SOUL AND JOY PHOTO COLLECTIVE
English
Published by Rubis Mecenat
2017
FREE FROM MY HAPPINESS
English
Published by Rubis Mecenat
2015
IN THOKOZA
English
Published by Rubis Mecenat
2013
Born in 1997 in Thokoza, South Africa. Lives and works in Thokoza, South Africa.
Sibusiso Bheka’s work documents his environment by night, giving us to see his reality of Thokoza, his playful moments almost surreal just before light disappears. His work is a testimony to South Africa’s violent past as well as a celebration of the intense beauty that can be found in the details of daily life in a township.
Sibusiso Bheka is Of Soul and Joy’s Project Assistant and graduated in photography from the Vaal University of Technology in 2018.
His series Stop Nonsense was part of the 11th edition Rencontres de Bamako -African Biennale of photography in 2017 as a traveling exhibition. The series was also shown at the National Museum of World Culture, Leiden, Netherlands in 2018. Bheka was shortlisted for the Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellowship in 2018 and was recently shortlisted for the Belfast Photo Festival.
His work was shown at the Ithuba Arts Gallery, Johannesburg (2013), the Addis Foto Fest, Ethiopia (2014), the Ghent International Photo Festival, Belgium (2015), the Johannesburg Art Gallery in South Africa (2016), Arles Photo Encounters (2020) Bristol Photo Festival (2021).
He is currently in Paris for a 3 month residency at the prestigious Cité internationale des arts.
Please read Magical Realism, an essay by Sean O’Toole
STOP NONSENSE
2016 – ongoing
Stop Nonsense
Between 1991 and 1994, from Nelson Mandela’s release to the first democratic election in South Africa, it is estimated that 3000 people were killed in Thokoza. The apartheid government is widely believed to have ignited the Black-on-Black violence. Today, Thokoza is plagued by a complex web of issues that trace back to the segregationist Apartheid-era laws, and is marked by shanty huts and sprawl with dusty unkempt streets associated with crime and poverty. However, Bheka believes that understanding a place is about engaging with its harsh realities and also facing the illusions one may have about it. This body of work defies the preconceived notions of our overlooked and stigmatised neighbourhood to reveal the intricacy and loveliness of daily life in Thokoza. This is not an easy mission because Bheka shoots mainly at night. If the night embodies a world of dreams and possibilities it also epitomises danger and violence. His photographs snap and play with all these truths. Light and colour play a predominant role in his work, influencing both the outcome and his creative process on a conscious and subconscious level. The yellow-orange light and pitch-black shadows in his work refers back to the high-mask lights built in all the townships of the country during the apartheid. These lights were used by the police and the military to control all the comings and goings of people of colour who were not allowed to circulate freely. His work is a testimony to this violent past as well as a celebration of the intense beauty that can be found in the details of daily life in a township. Bheka reveals the poetic truth behind the complexities of any nation wounded and yet full of hope.