AREA CODES: AGAINST THE GRAIN – 2025 MATRIC EXHIBITION

Zeitz MOCAA’s BMW Centre for Art Education presents Area Codes: Against the Grain, the 2025 matric exhibition on show in the Level -1 Tunnels of the museum from Saturday, 28 June until Sunday, 31 August 2025.

Where do you stay? Where are you from?  

Two simple questions, with far from simple answers. South Africa has a deep history of spatial discrimination, and the places where we stay are one area where these scars are most visible. Our area codes, the four-digit numbers assigned to each suburb, cannot capture the legacies of history, oppression and memories of each person who stays there. What if we were to reimagine the boundaries of what defines an area code? 

These questions were posed to the Grade 12 Visual Art learners who participated in the 2025 Matric Workshop, to interrogate notions of place and belonging by looking at and researching their area codes. The Annual Matric Workshop, hosted by the BMW Centre for Art Education, invites Grade 12 Visual Art learners from around Cape Town to come together each year to engage with and respond to an exhibition at Zeitz MOCAA. 

Taking inspiration from UNDERSTUDIES, the solo exhibition by Nolan Oswald Dennis on Level 3 of Zeitz MOCAA, the workshop began in April with four intensive days of discussion, experimentation and working in alternative mediums. At the end of the workshop, we asked the participants to research their own area codes, collecting found objects from the places they live, working in a similar fashion to the artists who created Xenolith: Letsema, in the UNDERSTUDIES exhibition. These found materials are the conceptual focal point of the artworks featured in this exhibition. 

These artworks were created over the course of nine weeks, with intense guidance, support and feedback from the facilitators in the form of crit sessions and working Saturdays, not to mention many afternoons spent working tirelessly after school and exams. Many of them worked in mediums completely outside of their comfort zone, experimenting and being exposed to techniques they have never had the opportunity to explore in the traditional classroom space. 

ARTISTS

!Khuboab Lawrence
Ameen Mustapha
Chloé la Grange
Declan James
Delroy Chakiza
Devike September
Eve O’Connor
Ilané Kotze
Jackson-Forrest Brown
Kaitlin christians
Kauthar Thompson
Kiara Patel
Matthew Owen
Melissa Bruce
Michael Roman
Sarah Boardman-Smith
Skyla-Jade Van Zyl
Sofie de Villiers
Tara Josephs 

PARTICIPATING SCHOOLS

Alexander Sinton High School
Bishops Diocesan College
Bridgehouse High School
Camps Bay High School
Cedar High School
Peter Clarke Art Centre
Reddam Constantia
PJ Olivier Art Centre 
Rustenburg Girls High School
South Peninsula High School
Springfield Convent High School
Wynberg Boys High School
Wynberg Girls High School