Sculpture

The story of the "Shona" stone carvers, a network of African sculptors active under Rhodesian white-minority rule during the 1960s, constitutes a challenging and under-explored, yet critical, chapter in the history of independence-era African modernism. Centered on a cluster of workshops, whose western expat proprietors emphasized the unschooled naiveté, spiritual directness, and authenticity of their black artists, this movement nevertheless provided those artists with both economic stability and a significant outlet for individual creative expression. It also claimed to revitalize a centuries-old legacy of excellence in stone carving evident in the celebrated bird sculptures and dry masonry traditions produced in Great Zimbabwe (ca. 1000–1600) and earlier settlements in southeastern Africa.

The author of this sculpture, evocative of a bird or insect, was known both as Henry Munyaradzi and Henry Mzengerere. A carpenter in the tobacco industry, he began his artistic career at Tengenenge around 1967 or 1968. In the pursuit of sculptural perfection, he conceived his biomorphic works as a balanced interplay of hard-edged, geometric and rounded forms. Here, the face is sparsely demarcated with two incised circular eyes and a notched nose and mouth. A linear spine carved through the center of its body is framed by gently sloping shoulders that terminate in wing-like forms. As with this early example, many of his subjects suggest a metamorphosing being, caught somewhere between a larval and fully formed state. The figure slopes gently upwards from its base, as if emerging from the ground, or even unfurling towards flight. Exclusively Shona speaking, and an adherent of his ancestral traditions, Munyaradzi frequently sought to express dimensions of his spirituality through his work.