27 May

Reflections of a Queen

Kganya Mogashoa

Front Gallery: 26.06.25 - 31.07.25

In Reflections of a Queen, visual artist Kganya Mogashoa presents a powerful continuation of her acclaimed Sheroes Rands series, first launched in 2023. While Sheroes Rands reimagined women’s representation on banknotes and coins, challenging how society assigns value to women’s contributions. This new body of work dives deeper into the lived realities, spiritual depths, and historical presence of women across generations from different geographical locations.

At its core, Reflections of a Queen is a visual testimony - an offering of truth in a world where Black history has too often been dislodged from statute books, sidelined in curricula, and erased from mainstream narratives. Mogashoa’s art becomes a form of preservation - documenting stories, honouring biblical wisdom, and restoring what has been systemically forgotten. Through each portrait, the artist reclaims cultural space, embedding history back into public consciousness through visual language.

This exhibition is both a celebration and an act of resistance. Mogashoa addresses the daily injustices faced by women - gender-based violence, economic exclusion and social invisibility - and transformes them into layered works of reverence and protest. Her use of African textiles and sacred symbols speaks to legacy, faith, and the richness of identity beyond imposed limitations.

In this series, Mogashoa introduces an evocative new element to her practice: ‘fragranced art’. By infusing select works with scent, she deepens the sensory impact of her storytelling. Fragrance, like memory, like spirit, lingers. It calls us to pause, to breathe, and to remember. These olfactory notes evoke divine femininity, and the quiet power of presence, turning each viewing into a full-bodied experience.

The queens in these works are not imagined—they are known. They are grandmothers, daughters, leaders, and survivors. Their crowns are woven through adversity, their voices rooted in lived truth. They are soft, steadfast, scarred, and sovereign. Reflections of a Queen is more than an exhibition, it is a call to restore what was stolen, to uplift what has been hidden, and to see women not only as figures of endurance, but as keepers of history, culture, and sacred power. Through this body of work, Kganya Mogashoa invites us to remember, witness, and rise above societal limitations.

Ruby Wilson