NELLY GUAMBE

Nelly Guambe, born in 1987, is a Mozambican selftaught artist whose paintings delve into the emotions and situations of being. Her artistic journey began in 2010 at Nucleo de Arte, the Mozambican Artist Association, following her graduation in International Relations and Diplomacy from South Africa.

Nelly Guambe’s paintings explore and reflect on human emotions and circumstances. Using acombination of drawing and painting her work is subtly haunting yet delicate and restrained, evokinga feeling of restlessness that does not aim to resist nor represent the disquietude of the universe, but instead intends to express. Finding her inspiration in people whom she encounters in everyday life and work, as well as in herself, her art responds to a powerful urge to document and record their state of being.

With their hallmark penetrating eyes, her portraits evoke a probing uncertainty, a certain restlessness that frequently leaves the viewer with questions rather than answers. The tension between positive and negative coexists in equal measure in each work – Guambe’s portraits perhaps shed light on the fundamental state of ambivalence in which many people find themselves, amidst both opportunity and constraint.

The themes of everyday womanhood and the human figure are also reflected in the artist’s simultaneous venture into fashion design. Guambe established two up-cycling fashion brands between 2012 and 2016, and in 2017 she co-founded the Deal Creative Space in Maputo, which promotes Design, Entertainment, Arts, and Literature.

Guambe’s first solo exhibition, “Inquietude (Restlessness)” took place in September 2017 at the Nucleo de Arte, Maputo. In 2018, her work has been included in group shows at Guns & Rain Gallery; Johannesburg, as well Stevenson gallery in Cape Town and Johannesburg. Guambe has exhibited at international Fairs: FNB Joburg Art Fair and Cape Town art Fair by Guns and Rain and her work was presented at 1:54 London by Ed Cross Fine Art.

She is the winner of the inaugural Emerging Painting Invitational prize, Harare, and the Mozal prize, Mozambique, in the Category ‘Artes Plasticas’ (both 2019).

Her work has been collected by Robert Devereux, ARAK Collection in Qatar ,amongst others.

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Nelly Guambe currently lives and works in Maputo, Mozambique.

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