BUQAQAWULI NOBAKADA

Buqaqawuli Nobakada (b. 2000) is a contemporary mixed media artist born in the Western Cape and raised between Philippi and a rural village in Lady Frere in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. She was first introduced to fine art in Johannesburg during her early adolescence.

Nobakada primarily works with acrylic paint on laced paper, often incorporating custom clay and gold jewellery into her compositions. Her work celebrates moments of border crossing those that occur within imagination, within the mind, and within lived experience.

She studied Fine Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand and has participated in several group exhibitions, including I Am & Nothing Else at Affinity Art Gallery in Lagos, Nigeria; Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt at Open City through FNB Art Joburg; and the SOMA exhibition in France.

Artist Statement

Buqaqawuli Nobakada’s mixed media works are poignant expressions of the Black female experience. Her practice explores what it means to embody womanhood the contemplative strength, tenderness, and responsibility that often accompany occupying space as a woman.

At the core of her work is a commitment to crafting images that younger girls, particularly Black girls, can see themselves within. Through her imagery, she aims to affirm that the spaces often depicted as distant or unattainable are spaces they too can inhabit.

Reflecting on her recent work, Nobakada explains her interest in painting figures within luxurious settings:

“I had a conversation with a cousin who comes from the same context I started in. I told her I wanted a house with an infinity pool and she didn’t know what that was. I realised then that I wanted to paint those kinds of spaces. She has never seen someone who looks like her in those environments owning or existing within them so she can’t dream of them or work toward them. Even when she looks at magazines with luxury homes, the families in those images don’t look like her or anyone around her. She grows up thinking she doesn’t deserve that life or doesn’t belong there. That’s what I want to change.”

Through images of women surrounded by symbols of success fast cars, luxury spaces, and styled beauty, Nobakada creates visual possibilities for younger versions of herself and others like her. Her work becomes a space where aspiration, identity, and imagination converge, allowing new futures to be envisioned.