Bag Factory Presents A Studio of Their Own: Young Womxn Studio Bursary 2025 Two solo presentations by Ndaya Ilunga & Nazeerah Jacub
A shared studio on a street in Fordsburg has been a site of reflection, imagination, excavating deep wells of interiority, and ultimately capturing visions and stories on canvas. In the spirit of what Athambile Masola calls ukuzilanda, that is to “fetch[ing] oneself in relation to the past,” Ndaya Ilunga and Nazeerah Jacub plumb the psyche and the environment to contemplate themes of memory, becoming, belonging, self-actualisation and femaleness.
Holding their different approaches alongside each other allows them to resist flattening perceptions of womxn’s interior worlds and creative processes, enabling them to recognise the “parallel worlds” they move through “and how these worlds [are] rarely encountered simultaneously.” Alongside their contrasting styles of figuration and abstraction they hold a shared contemplation of nature as a symbol of lineage.
In A Studio of Their Own, we see the manifestation of the privilege of having space to question, reflect, make and be in conversation. Ilunga and Jacub are part of a full and rich narrative of women artists across time and circumstance who have passed through the Bag Factory and other community art spaces before them.
“…she placed one soft hand over her land. It was a gesture of belonging.” — A Question of Power by Bessie Head, 1973
The Young Womxn Studio Bursary award is founded and supported by Sam Nhlengethwa.
This show runs from 4 – 31 October 2025.
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Bag Factory Presents A Studio of Their Own: Young Womxn Studio Bursary 2025 Two solo presentations by Ndaya Ilunga & Nazeerah Jacub
A shared studio on a street in Fordsburg has been a site of reflection, imagination, excavating deep wells of interiority, and ultimately capturing visions and stories on canvas. In the spirit of what Athambile Masola calls ukuzilanda, that is to “fetch[ing] oneself in relation to the past,” Ndaya Ilunga and Nazeerah Jacub plumb the psyche and the environment to contemplate themes of memory, becoming, belonging, self-actualisation and femaleness.
Holding their different approaches alongside each other allows them to resist flattening perceptions of womxn’s interior worlds and creative processes, enabling them to recognise the “parallel worlds” they move through “and how these worlds [are] rarely encountered simultaneously.” Alongside their contrasting styles of figuration and abstraction they hold a shared contemplation of nature as a symbol of lineage.
In A Studio of Their Own, we see the manifestation of the privilege of having space to question, reflect, make and be in conversation. Ilunga and Jacub are part of a full and rich narrative of women artists across time and circumstance who have passed through the Bag Factory and other community art spaces before them.
“…she placed one soft hand over her land. It was a gesture of belonging.” — A Question of Power by Bessie Head, 1973
The Young Womxn Studio Bursary award is founded and supported by Sam Nhlengethwa.
