I’m not your typical artist. At 24, I’ve found my own place in the South African art scene, creating with whatever materials I can get my hands on instead of sticking to paint and canvas. I was born in Ladysmith and now live on the South Coast, but I’ve moved around a lot growing up, which shaped both me and my art.

My background is a mix of Indian and Xhosa, and like many families, we went through tough times financially. In 2017, while I was still in school, my family went without food for days. All I had was a pencil and some old library pages, so I started sketching at the beach. That’s when someone asked me to draw my very first portrait. I had no idea what I was doing, but I went for it—and that moment sparked my journey as an artist.

“All I had was a small pencil. Without any paper, I walked to the local library and grabbed some old library pages. I began
drawing at the beach and that’s when I met my first customer.

He saw me sketching and asked me to do a portrait of his grandchild. Despite having
never done art before, my desperate circumstances gave me the courage to accept the commission. I had nothing but
my hands, but I used them to give life to a creative voice I didn’t know I had.”

His artworks are striking. His medium of choice? Lipstick.

“I began painting with lipstick in 2023, when I couldn’t afford traditional art supplies,” he says.

“While searching through the bins behind a local shopping center, I stumbled upon a box of discarded makeup, which included lipstick. I instantly fell in love with the texture of lipstick, and that’s what led me to explore it as a medium.”