2017
Acrylic and ink on  Hahnemühle paper
107 x 78 cm
On long-term loan from the Zeitz Collection.

The use of text and quotes, in this work on paper, reads like a personal diary entry. The confession of a nightmarish dream articulates the insecurities experienced from being uncertain of one’s place in a relationship.

Khoza uses the internet’s popular culture, and the posts shared frequently on social media, like memoirs that reveal an individual’s private fears or innermost thoughts. The public becomes the reader of the testimony, but also an audience for the social performativity of a person’s life.

The figure, half in shadow, evokes a sinister feeling that dominates and obstructs the figure standing next to it. Their spatial relations within the frame alludes to their relationship’s power dynamic based on class and gender roles. Popular illusory photos of couple’s vacations, usually in settings of luxury and splendour promoted on social media, can evoke a desire for the adulation of their relationship and achievement of high social status.

Sakhisizwe Gcina, AKO Foundation Assistant Curator of Special Projects, Curatorial Lab