Engineering the New Jerusalem II

Lwandiso Njara

The FynArts Gallery in association with Lizamore & Associates showcases a solo exhibition by Lwandiso Njara; Engineering the New Jerusalem II. This body of work is a reflection of his own understanding of the renewal of identity.

Growing-up in a traditional Xhosa household, Lwandiso Njara’s Catholic schooling by nuns from India and Switzerland exposed him to different ideologies and technologies. In Engineering the New Jerusalem II, Njara depicts his understanding of a changing identity – as influenced by his upbringing and education. This body of takes form in pen, graphite & charcoal drawings and sculptures in PPC cement, resin, animal bone and steel. The artist portrays a cross-pollinated sense of identity which emerges from the physical hybridity of his sculptures and drawings. “I believe that my work resembles or explores the new contemporary robotic or technological African urban identity” says the artist. He often blatantly merges polarities in one body through using the lamb, the goat and the cow fused with mechanical gears and engines, all acting as signifiers for the artist’s own hybrid sense of identity.