16 Facts About Malangatana Ngwenya

Malangatana Valente Ngwenya was a Mozambican painter and poet.

Malangatana Ngwenya frequently exhibited work under his first name alone, as Malangatana.

Malangatana Ngwenya died on 5 January 2011 in Matosinhos, Portugal.

In 1958, Malangatana Ngwenya attended some functions of Nucleo de Arte, a local artists' organization, and received support from the painter Ze Julio.

The next year Malangatana Ngwenya exhibited publicly for the first time, as part of a group show; two years later came his first solo exhibition, at the age of 25.

In 1964, Malangatana Ngwenya, who had joined the nationalistic FRELIMO guerrilla, was detained by the PIDE, the Portuguese secret police of the Estado Novo regime, and spent 18 months in jail.

Malangatana Ngwenya was given a grant from the Lisbon-based Gulbenkian Foundation in 1971, and studied engraving and ceramics in Portugal, Europe.

Malangatana Ngwenya's work was shown throughout Africa, and is in the collection of the National Museum of African Art in Washington, DC.

Malangatana Ngwenya helped to start a number of cultural institutions in Mozambique, and was a founder of the Mozambican Peace Movement.

Malangatana Ngwenya was awarded the Nachingwea Medal for his Contribution to Mozambican Culture, and was made a Grande Oficial da Ordem do Infante D Henrique.

Malangatana Ngwenya was awarded a degree honoris causa by the University of Evora in 2010.

Malangatana Ngwenya died at the age of 74 on 5 January 2011, in Matosinhos, northern Portugal, after a long illness.

Malangatana Ngwenya was a writer, and in 1963 some of his poetry was published in the literary magazine Black Orpheus, and his work was included in the anthology Modern Poetry from Africa, edited by Gerald Moore and Ulli Beier.

Malangatana Ngwenya revived African indigenous aesthetics, performing an anti-colonial identity, dialectically opposed to the imposed colonial structures present in 1960's Mozambique.

Malangatana Ngwenya had a contentious relationship with Christianity that expresses itself in his artwork.

Malangatana Ngwenya depicts a mother nursing her child on the left side of the canvas, and a mother and her soldier son holding hands, despite their separation created by the soldier's gun.