Zanele Muholi: Courageous Beauty
IMS Paulista
Exhibition texts
Zanele Muholi in Brazil: a special moment in visual art and activism
Courageous Beauty, the first anthological exhibition of Zanele Muholi in Brazil is a special moment, not just because of the relevance of the artistic work presented, but also in the way it activates and emancipates the identities and ways of life of non-binary people and those from LGBTQIAPN+ communities, who have been segregated, discriminated against, and subjected to violence in Brazil, in South Africa, and in many other countries. Muholi prefers to be defined as a “visual activist” rather than an “artist”. Their work and the moments in which it appears are inseparable from the politically conscious act of expressing the beauty and humanity of people whose visibility and dignity in life has been stolen from them, particularly due to their gender and sexual orientation, further deepening the pain of racial and social discrimination that sadly predominate in a world where colonial inheritance and heteropatriarchal power are two sides of the same coin.
In Zanele’s work, artistic creation is inseparable from civil and political ethics manifest in the representation of the black lesbian women and non-binary people who we encounter there. In their early photographic work (today recognized internationally as fundamental in the context of contemporary art and photography), and in the expansion of their forms of expression into painting and sculpture, one of the qualities of this ever present activism is the solidarity and awareness involved in engaging those who are represented in the actual representation itself. The choice of photography and the visual arts as a medium is intrinsically linked to the understanding that any person, irrespective of literacy, can engage with them as a starting point for looking and thinking. Zanele Muholi had the courage to confront post-apartheid South Africa with the economic, geographic and social marginalization of its queer populations, who had been subjected to hate and prejudice with limited or no access to education, work, health, housing and essential support structures. We know that exclusion and violence are equally evident in Brazil, and this has given rise to incredibly courageous forms of self-organization in the fight for civil and social rights. Inviting Zanele Muholi to present their work in Brazil has allowed for a series of encounters with trans and queer associations, collectives, and organizations, establishing networks of complicity and solidarity with non-binary people in São Paulo and throughout the country. With this exhibition, for which Zanele has produced specific work, Brazil has also become part of this visual activism.
All of this has been possible thanks to the combined efforts of the curatorial team together with other teams at the IMS, with particular emphasis on the role played by the collective of trans people who work here at the institution. We express our gratitude to all, highlighting the extraordinary, highly competent, and rigorous perspective developed by Daniele Queiroz and Thyago Nogueira, the exhibition’s curators, with curatorial assistance from Ana Paula Vitório. Equally, we wish to acknowledge all the IMS teams involved in this project. We dedicate a final special word of thanks to Zanele Muholi for their work and generosity, dedication, and time, which we all consider an honor and for having the enormous privilege of collaborating which has resulted in this anthological presentation of visual activism in Brazil.
The beauty, affection, emancipation and humanity that Zanele Muholi's work portrays offer us a unique insight into many stories, struggles and lives, resonating with of the beautiful phrase from Audre Lorde that Zanele shares in their work: “our labor has become more important than our silence”.
Board of Directors of the Instituto Moreira Salles
Courageous Beauty
An exponent of contemporary visual activism, Zanele Muholi works to guarantee rights and respect for South Africa’s black LGBTQIAPN+ population. Through photography Muholi presents everyday life in their community, valuing beauty, affection and perseverance, but also denouncing injustice, aggression and violence. This is the first anthological exhibition in Latin America, featuring Muholi’s production from the 2000s until today.
Muholi was born in Umlazi, Durban, in 1972 during the apartheid regime (1948-1994) which institutionalized racial segregation in South Africa and expanded the privileges of the country’s white elite. The end of apartheid and the new Constitution implemented by Nelson Mandela in 1996 – that prohibited discrimination on the grounds of race, sexual orientation and gender – were not enough to deter racism, prejudice and hate crimes against the LGBTQIAPN+ community. With the intention of fighting against this reality, Muholi studied photography and began to report on episodes of violence, particularly against black lesbians. In 2004 their work gained national attention.
Over time Muholi has moved from denunciatory photographs to images that celebrate lives and pave the way for empowerment. In Faces and Phases (2006 - today), a series that received international attention shortly after it began, Muholi invites each participant to choose the way they would like to be presented, developing an exchange of respect and trust that is present in all of their works. This immense and ongoing visual archive of the South African LGBTQIAPN+ community is a blunt response to the lack of concrete means for guaranteeing the rights established in the Constitution.
Muholi’s activism reaches beyond South Africa’s borders and photographic production to include victim support, funding for artists, the upkeep of residencies and the creation of online platforms such as the Inkanyiso website which opens space to the community to narrate their own stories and fight for their rights.
Muholi began the Somnyama Ngonyama series in 2012 portraying themself in different cities around the world with everyday props found in homes and hotel rooms. With their exuberant darkness and challenging gaze, Muholi affirms their beauty and responds to the way that photography has been used throughout history to typify and subjugate ethnic and social groups in colonized countries. Making oneself visible on one’s own terms is a form of resistance.
Identifying as a person of non-binary gender, Muholi has created photographs that deconstruct the standards of masculine and feminine in search of freedom and fluidity. Their work values the common beauty – everyday and community orientated – transformed into an extraordinary experience. Their struggle for justice and dignity uplifts all people.
In 2024, Muholi visited organizations, artists and activists in São Paulo to bring force to this common fight for rights. Photos and videos produced during their visit are presented for the first time in this exhibition.
Daniele Queiroz is curator of Contemporary Art at the Instituto Moreira Salles.
Thyago Nogueira is curator and coordinator of Contemporary Art at the Instituto Moreira Salles.
Ana Paula Vitório is an independent curator, researcher and teacher.
“I portray half the picture and leave the viewer with the responsibility of completing the other part of the image.” Zanele Muholi
In one of their first photographic series, Zanele Muholi portrays the South African LGBTQIAPN+ community as part of their work for the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), co-founded by Muholi in 2002. The photographs document people who have suffered violence related to race or gender through “corrective” aggression and rape. Influenced by the documentary photography of David Goldblatt, who was their mentor at the beginning of their career, Only Half the Picture was produced a few years after the end of apartheid in 1994, and the adoption of the new Constitution in 1996 which made the country the first in the world to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. The conservative reaction to these achievements led to increased violence, denounced in these photographs.
Muholi photographs the victims with affection and sensitivity. Framing exposes scars but protects identities. The photographs present people who challenge the standards of beauty imposed by patriarchal heteronormative society, showing breasts with hair, love between women and other instances of affection and pleasure.
The re-democratization of South Africa from 1995 resulted in important achievements for the LGBTQIAPN+ population, but these advances took time to start making a positive impact on everyday realities. Gender violence, particularly against black lesbian women, increased at the beginning of the 2000s when Muholi created the Being series.
The photographs present black South African lesbian women couples in private spaces on the outskirts of urban centers during the apartheid period. In photographing these women and the love they shared, Muholi expanded our visual repertoire and contributed so that racialized and LGBTQIAPN+ people could be disassociated from situations of violence and scarcity.
The series also counters the idea that homosexuality is the result of colonization by presenting the affection within same sex or gender fluid couples associated with traditional aspects of ethnicity.
“We have to remind these people of the difference they make in our communities. This has been my approach in terms of a queer archive.” Zanele Muholi
Beauty contests for women were a common feature on television and in the press in many countries during the second half of the 20th century. Set against the background of post-Cold War political activity, competitions such as Miss World and Miss Universe celebrated a certain type of white beauty while setting unreachable standards for much of the rest of the population. Separate contests had been held for white and black women in South Africa in the 70s. The first Miss World South Africa was crowned in 1992 following fierce resistance.
Most of those portrayed in Brave Beauties took part in Miss Gay RSA (Republic of South Africa), an independent initiative that allowed any person to apply whether “masculine by birth and identifying as trans, gay or queer within the Rainbow Community”. The series includes scores of posed black and white portraits, systematized in the same way as in Faces and Phases, one of Muholi’s best known collections. Showing half or all of the body, participants are invited to pose in whatever way they feel most beautiful. The variety of gazes, gestures and poses reflects a broad and diverse community, united by pride, and the courage required to fight against stigma and violence. Each photograph celebrates a life and those personal victories while also forming a link in a stronger, longer, and more visible chain.
Miss D`vine is a South African activist and performer. When Muholi met her in the 90s, D`vine was working in the Skyline bar, a LGBTQIAPN+ space in Johannesburg. It took years to arrive at the intimacy required to photograph her in daylight, at the top of a hill. In these photos D`vine takes on a number of roles, parading in a traditional beaded tanga, a black party dress and a rainbow skirt, a symbol of the LGBTQIAPN+ community. The red high heels emphasize feminine sensuality.
Clinging to a fence or seated in front of dry brush, D`vine is like a film actor. Her exuberant, confident, yet also vulnerable personality challenges traditional representation with a humanity that is lacking among certain stars in the genre. The portraits of D`vine also celebrate her trans and black beauty while celebrating the glamour of so many performers that choose the night as their stage for resistance.
“It goes beyond just being queer. It’s a way of life, a sacred existence that will survive us.” Zanele Muholi
In South African LGBTQIAPN+ slang the word “beulah” means “beauty”, “beautiful woman”. In Muholi’s work Beulahs is the title for a number of portraits of gay feminine people in poses that shift between vigor and fragility. Color provides a natural informal air to these portraits in contrast with the black and white documentary style and the compositional rigor of other series from this time. In these closed spaces the Beulahs exude vulnerability: in the light of day, this hesitation gives way to assertion.
Living in safety is a daily battle. The marks of daily violence are present in these portraits, even if they are not always noticed. Chests exposed, Muzi Ashley Khumalo and Bayabonga lean against a barbed wire fence, a symbol of the brutal segregation that tore through South Africa. Stanley, a colleague of Muholi’s on the LGBTQIAPN+ platform for rights, Behind the Mask, reveals the scar of a stab wound inflicted by an ex-partner. In a touching portrait, Madame La Rochelle, a celebrated performer at the Simply Blue bar in Johannesburg, presents us with a lost gaze. La Rochelle would die two years later from serious illness.
In this collection of self-portraits Muholi roleplays their participation in a beauty contest.
Here Muholi dons the types of accessories commonly seen in beauty pageant competitions, such as swimsuits, dresses, heels and crowns, in poses that are distorted or that suggest weight lifting postures, in a setting that seems run down.
Muholi wears a sash that reads “Miss Black Lesbian” in reference to Ms Sappho, a beauty contest organized in South Africa at the end of the 90s. A finalist in the 1997 edition, Muholi highlights the importance of the contest in celebrating black LGBTQIAPN+ beauty during the re-democratization of the country.
The series questions Western standards for beauty and gender that persist in visual arts, advertising, entertainment and contemporary photography.
This series of self-portraits emerged in 2012 in response to a racist incident that Muholi experienced during an artistic residency in Italy.
In photographs taken in cities around the world, Muholi draws surprising power from everyday objects, such as blankets, pillows, masking tape and ashtrays, to highlight social and political contexts of South African history and the countries she visits. In Basizeni xi, Muholi wears flat bicycle tires. Bicycles were an important means of transportation for non-white populations during apartheid due to limited public transportation and have become a symbol of black resistance in South African townships.
In Zulu, Muholi’s first language, “Ngonyama” means “lion/lioness”. This word is also the name of the clan of Muholi’s mother, who spent her whole working life as a domestic cleaner for white South African families. In the title of the series Muholi pays tribute to their mother and her ancestrality. In the images entitled Bester, domestic objects such as steel wool scrubbers and clothes pegs also celebrate Muholi’s mother and the black working class South African population.
The Zulu presence in many of the titles reinforces the fight against linguistic discrimination which sees English predominate over native South African languages. The darkness of the skin, emphasized by the photographic treatment, produces an exuberant beauty, often associated with a direct, face-on gaze, looking back at the viewer.
Documenting their travels around the world, inner journeys, and highs and lows, is a way of writing their own story, celebrating their origins and curing themself.
Muholi’s best known series today consists of hundreds of black and white photographs. The project brings together portraits of black lesbians, non-binary people and trans men, forming a specific cross-section within the LGBTQIAPN+ community itself.
The faces are the image each participant chooses to reveal, often in photographs taken over the course of several years; the phases record the passing of time, as well as the transition process and the affirmation of gender. Starting with the aim of building an archive of the South African LGBTQIAPN+ community, Muholi also documents their own faces and phases.
The photographs are taken in a range of spaces making use of available light and backgrounds that include walls, tarpaulins, sheets and rugs. The presence of printed graphics on textile expands on the tradition of studio photographers, such as Malick Sidibé, Felicia Abban and Seydou Keïta. Each person is photographed as they wish to be seen, guaranteeing that they feel beautiful and empowered. These faces contain stories and unite in a struggle for representation and visibility. The diversity of the group is amplified by the presentation in a grid, since empty spaces point to the constant arrival of new portraits and the departure of others.
The series recently came to include participants from Brazil, Canada and the UK.
This chronology brings together important events in Zanele Muholi's career, the political history of South Africa, the LGBTQIAPN+ movement and the black movement in Brazil in the 20th century.
▲ Zanele Muholi
● South Africa
■ Brasil: LGBTQIAPN+
♦ Brasil: Movimento Negro
1941
■ The “Vagrancy Act” is created to criminalize poverty and Afro-Brazilian cultural expressions and could lead to a prison sentence for anyone who could not prove they were an authorized laborer. Later, the act was also used to persecute the trans community due to the difficulty they faced in accessing the formal job market.
1944
♦ Abdias do Nascimento creates the Black Experimental Theater (TEN) aimed at valuing Afro-Brazilian communities and culture through education and art.
1948
- The National Party takes power in South Africa and institutionalizes apartheid, the political regime based on the segregation of people according to race. Up until 1994 white minority dominance was imposed on the non-white population.
1949
- A Law is established for the Prohibition of Interracial Marriages between whites and people of other racial groups in South Africa.
1950
- The Population Registration Act, the first major legislation created in apartheid, established identity cards that defined a racial category for every person over 18 years. The Group Areas Act, the regime’s second pillar, destroys a range of urban areas and determines where people should live according to race. Non-white families and communities are shifted to the townships, areas created in the urban periphery. The Immorality Act prohibits sexual relations and extramarital relations between whites and people of all other racial groups.
1952
- The Pass Laws demand that non-white people over the age of 16 carry pass notes. This document shows the individual’s identity, ethnicity and profession, and determines where people can travel to and work.
1953
- The Bantu Education Act creates racially segregated schools. The new curriculum reduces the quality and the educational resources for black people.
1954
- The Federation of South African Women (fedsaw), a multiracial organization of women against apartheid begins its activities.
1956
- On August 9, the Women’s March on Pretoria unites 20 thousand people in protest against the Pass Laws and apartheid. South Africa now celebrates Nation Women’s Day on this date.
1959
■ The first surgery in Brazil for sexual reassignment on an intersexual transexual man is performed by Doctor José Eliomar da Silva, in Itajaí (SC).
1960
- Sharpeville Massacre: on March 21, supporters of the Pan African Congress (PAC) march on the Sharpeville police station in Gauteng province, in protest against the Pass Laws and demanding a minimum wage of 35 pounds. The police kill 69 protestors and wound a further 186. The United Nation declares the date International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, in memory of the victims.
1963
- In the Rivonia Trial, Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki, Elias Motsoaledi, Andrew Mlangeni and Denis Goldberg are sentenced to life imprisonment, accused of attempting to overthrow apartheid. Between 1964 and 1977, Winnie Mandela spends more than 15 months in different South African prisons and a further 10 months in solitary confinement.
1963-1969
■ Snob, one of the first openly homosexual publications in Brazil, is created in Rio by Agildo Guimarães, originally from Pernambuco.
1968
- The Homosexual Law Reform Fund is formed. It is the first gay resistance organization in South Africa.
1970
- The Black Homeland Citizenship Act is implemented and joins the Group Areas Act as part of a plan to remove black South Africans from their land and homes. Between 1960 and 1989, over 3.5 million people classified as non-white are forcibly displaced.
1971
■ Doctor Roberto Farina carries out the first Brazilian surgery for sexual reassignment on a transexual woman. He is sentenced to two years in prison in the first instance and acquitted in the second instance.
1972
▲ Zanele Muholi is born in Umlazi, a township in Durban, in the province of KwaZulu-Natal.
1976
- Soweto Uprising: on June 16, black students protest peacefully in Soweto, singing for improvements to the education system, when police officers violently attack them. Among the first victims is 13 year old Hector Pieterson who becomes a symbol of the massacre. The ensuing wave of violence in the country leads world authorities to push for an end to the regime.
1977
■ Roberto Farina performs the first sexual reassignment surgery on a non-intersex transexual man: activist, psychologist and writer João W. Nery.
1978
■ SOMOS: Homossexual Affirmation Group is founded. The collective emerges from the publication Lampião da Esquina (1978-1981), a pioneering LGBTQIAPN+ newspaper in Brazil.
♦ The Black Movement United Against Racial Discrimination is created proposing the unification of the antiracist struggle at a national level.
1980
■ Violent police operations imprison hundreds of sex workers and LGBTQIAPN+ people, particularly transsexuals, in São Paulo. The NGO Gay Group of Bahia (GGB) is founded in Salvador – the oldest Brazilian LGBTQIAPN+ association in activity.
1981
■ The Lesbian Feminist Action Group (GALF), emerges in São Paulo leading to the creation of the lesbian activist publication ChanaComChana [PussywithPussy] (1981-1987). In Salvador, Adé Dudu, a group uniting LGBTQIAPN+ and antiracist struggles is founded.
1983
■ Ferro’s Bar Uprising: on August 19, after being prevented from selling the ChanaComChana bulletin in the lesbian region of the São Paulo capital, GALF activists protest in the space. The date is celebrated today as the National Day of Lesbian Pride.
1985
- The Delmas Treason Trial lasted until 1988. The apartheid state processed 22 activists for acting against the regime. Simon Nkoli was among the accused. A member of the Gay Association of South Africa, he funded the Saturday Group, the first organization for black gay people, and the Gay and Lesbian Organization of Witwatersrand (GLOW).
1986
■ The Health Ministry creates the National Program for Sexually Transmitted Disease (STD) and AIDS. Transsexual Brenda Lee embraces people suffering from AIDS in her guesthouse, the Palácio das Princesas [Princess Palace]. This was one of the first NGOs in Latin America to offer support to this population.
1988
- An amendment to the Immorality Act prohibits sex between women.
1989
▲ Photographer David Goldblatt launches Market Photo Workshop, a photography school, studio and gallery in Johannesburg.
1990
■ On May 17, the World Health Organization (WHO) removes homosexuality from the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). The date becomes known as the International Day for Combating LGBTIphobia.
- President F. W. de Klerk declares an institutional end to apartheid. Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners are freed. The ANC suspends armed fighting, but conflicts among diverse groups break out in the country until 1994. Around 14 thousand people die. The Gay and Lesbian Organization of Witwatersrand (GLOW) organizes Johannesburg’s first Gay Parade.
1992
■ The National Association of Transgender and the Liberated (ASTRAL) is founded in Rio de Janeiro. Jovanna Baby, one of the organizers, sets up the first bajubá dictionary: Diálogo de bonecas [Dialogue of the Dolls].
1993
- The Association of Bisexuals, Gays and Lesbians (ABIGALE) organizes the first Pride Parade in Cape Town.
1994
- The first democratic elections in South Africa take place on April 27, the date is known as Freedom Day. In a country with a population of over 28 million, until then just 3 million had voted. In the first free election valid votes totalled 19,726,579 and Nelson Mandela was elected president.
1995
■ On June 25, at the end of the 17th International Gay and Lesbian Conference of the ILGA, in Rio de Janeiro, the March for Citizenship took place, claimed to be the first LGBTIQIAPN+ Pride Parade in Brazil.
1996
■ On August 29, the 1st National Lesbian Seminar (SENALE) begins, a date that becomes known as National Lesbian Visibility Day. Law no. 9,313/1996 guarantees people living with HIV/AIDS free treatment through the Unified Health System (SUS).
- President Mandela announces the new Constitution of the Republic of South Africa. The country becomes the first in the world to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.
1998
■ On June 28, International LGBTQIAPN+ Pride Day, the first São Paulo Parade takes place featuring the motto “We are many, we’re present in all professions”.
2000
▲ Muholi begins working for Behind the Mask, an online magazine dedicated to LGBTQIAPN + issues in Africa.
2001
♦ The 3rd World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance takes place in Durban, South Africa. The emphasis on Brazilian participation results in a plan that will give rise to affirmative action policies, such as the racial quota system and the creation of the Special Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality.
2002
▲ Muholi co-founds the nonprofit Forum for Women's Empowerment (FEW). The institution starts out as a support organization for black lesbian women.
- South Africa becomes the first country on the continent to allow the adoption of children by same sex couples.
2003
♦ Law 10.639 is implemented and the teaching of Afro-Brazilian and African history and culture becomes mandatory in Brazil for elementary to high school age groups in both public and private schools.
▲ Muholi finishes the advanced photography course at the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg.
2004
■ With the launch of the first national campaign against transphobia, created by social movements in partnership with the Ministry of Health, January 29 is celebrated as National Trans Visibility Day.
▲ FEW holds the Soweto LGBTIQ Pride Parade. Muholi and FEW start The Chosen FEW, a lesbian soccer team in South Africa. Muholi's work attracts national media attention with their first exhibitions.
2006
▲ Muholi founds Inkanyiso, an organization dedicated to art, activism, media and advocacy.
- The Civil Union Act is passed. South Africa becomes the first country on the continent (and the fifth in the world) to legalize same-sex marriage.
2008
■ The Transsexualization Process, support for users with a demand for gender transition, is instituted in the public health system by the Ministry of Health.
2009
■ The Ministry of Health grants the right to use a personal name in the public health service.
▲ Muholi participates in the Bamako Meetings in Mali. They receive their master's degree in documentary film from Ryerson University in Canada. They participate in an anthology of short stories written by South African lesbians – the text is an excerpt from their diary in which they talk about the death of their mother in 2009.
2010
■ Jean Wyllys is elected federal deputy (PSOL/RJ), becoming the first openly LGBTQIAPN+ member of the Brazilian Congress. The Bajubá Collection, a community project to document the memories of Brazilian LGBTQIAPN+ communities, is created in Brasília. In 2017 it relocates to São Paulo.
▲ The documentary Difficult Love, directed by Zanele Muholi and Peter Goldsmith, is released. Muholi participates in the 29th Bienal de São Paulo, with the series Faces and Phases.
2011
■ The Brazilian Supreme Federal Court recognizes same-sex unions as family entities, equating them with a common-law marriage.
2012
■ The Center for Culture, Memory and Studies of Sexual Diversity of the State of São Paulo is created. In 2018, the center is renamed the Museum of Sexual Diversity, with the task of preserving the memory of the Brazilian LGBTQIAPN+ community.
▲ Muholi's Cape Town apartment is broken into and 20 hard drives storing their work from the past five years are stolen.
2014
■ Federal law no.12.984 defines as a crime “discrimination against carriers of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and AIDS patients”.
2015
■ The 1st National Meeting of Trans Men (ENAHT), organized by the Brazilian Institute of Transmasculinities (IBRAT), brings together more than 200 transmasculine people. The first date of the event, February 20, becomes the National Day of Transmasculine Visibility.
2016
■ Decree No. 8,727/2016 guarantees the right to a personal name within the scope of direct, autonomous and foundational federal public administration. It is one of President Dilma Rousseff's last actions before being impeached.
2017
■ On the initiative of journalist Iran Giusti, Casa 1 is founded, a São Paulo NGO that takes in young LGBTQIAPN+ people who have been expelled from their homes.
2018
■ The Brazilian Supreme Court guarantees the right for trans people to change their first name and sex on their civil registry. The Federal Council of Psychology legitimizes the “self-determination of transsexual and transvestite people in relation to their gender identities”. Erica Malunguinho is the first trans person to be elected state deputy (PSOL/SP) in Brazil. The NGO Casa Chama, founded and coordinated by trans people, is set up in the capital of São Paulo to guarantee dignity to trans populations.
♦ Marielle Franco, sociologist and city councillor in Rio de Janeiro is assassinated together with driver Anderson Pedro Gomes. Marielle becomes a symbol of the fight for black, LGBTQIAPN+ and women’s movements.
- The Prevention and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Act is passed by the legislature. Landa Mabenge becomes the first transgender man in South Africa to receive financial assistance towards surgery costs.
▲ Muholi publishes the book, Somnyama Ngonyama, Hail the Dark Lioness, vol. 1.
2019
■ The WHO's ICD 11 removes transsexuality from the category of mental disorder. The Brazilian Supreme Court criminalizes LGBTphobia, equating it to the crime of racism.
▲ Muholi’s work is included in the 58th Biennale de Venezia May you live in interesting times
2020
■ The Brazilian Supreme Court deems it unconstitutional to prevent homosexual cis men, transgender men and women from donating blood.
2022
■ Erika Hilton (PSOL/SP) and Duda Salabert (PDT/MG) are the first trans people elected federal deputies in Brazil.
▲ In Cape Town, Muholi founds the Muholi Art Institute, a travelling art institution for young people and visual artists in South Africa who are at the beginning of their career.
2023
♦ Black Awareness Day becomes a national holiday from the following year.
2024
▲ Muholi visits São Paulo to prepare their exhibition at Instituto Moreira Salles.
2025
▲ The exhibition Zanele Muholi: Courageous Beauty opens at Instituto Moreira Salles, São Paulo.
The LGBTQIAPN+ chronology was produced by the Educational Center of the São Paulo State Museum of Sexual Diversity. The chronology of South Africa and Zanele Muholi were developed by the Tate Modern for the Zanele Muholi exhibition and adapted by Ana Paula Vitorio. Daniele Queiroz wrote the chronology of the black movement.
Lesbian: People of the female gender who relate emotionally/sexually with people of the female gender.
Gay: People of the male gender who relate emotionally/sexually with people of the male gender.
Bissexual: People who relate emotionally/sexually with people regardless of their gender.
Transexuals, Travestis1 , Transgender: People who do not recognize themselves as having the gender attributed to them at birth.
Queer: A term Brazil has adopted that defines all people who do not perform their gender according to the expected norms for men or women.
Intersex: People whose physiological characteristics do not conform to the standard definitions of “male” or “female”.
Asexual: People who have emotional relationships, but do not necessarily feel sexual attraction (for any gender).
Pansexual: People who may develop physical attraction, love, and sexual desire for other people, regardless of their gender identity or biological sex. Pansexuality is a sexual orientation that specifically rejects the notion of two genders and even of sexual orientation itself.
Non-binary or Agender: People who do not identify with the male-female binary or with any gender.
Trans men or Transmasculine: People who see themselves as being of masculine gender, rather than the gender attributed at birth.
Trans women or Travestis: People who see themselves as being of feminine gender, rather than the gender attributed at birth.
Transgender: Term used to describe people who transit between genders. These are people whose gender identity transcends the conventional definitions of sexuality.
+: This sign includes all of the diversity within the field of gender diversity that is not represented by the initials, in particular identities that have only recently been claimed.
Allies: People who, irrespective of sexual orientation or gender identity, take action to promote LGBTQIAPN+ rights and inclusion. They are also known as “sympathizers”.
Glossary produced by the ims area for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
1 The term travesti, as used in Brazil, applies to people who are otherwise known as trans women, and does not correspond to transvestites or crossdressers.
Zol, 2002
In one of their first self portraits, taken when studying at the Market Photo Workshop, Zanele Muholi already confronts the camera. Despite not drinking or smoking, Muholi pretends to smoke in order to criticize, for example, the prejudiced vision of those who tend to assume that people with dreadlocks are users of cannabis. The evanescent smoke also evokes Muholi’s spirituality, reinforcing the discourse of the Only Half the Picture series by inviting the viewer to complete the meaning of the image.
Sobrevivente de crime de ódio e número da ocorrência
Hate crime survivor I and Case Number, 2004.
This diptych portrays a “corrective” rape survivor and a report stamped by the Police in Meadowlands – a township created during apartheid to receive black people who had been expulsed from other areas of Soweto in South Africa.
The term “corrective” rape is used to describe a hate crime in which the person is violated in an attempt to “correct” their gender identity or sexual orientation. Lesbian women, trans and non-binary people are often victims of this type of crime throughout the world.
(Being)
Katlego Mashiloane and Nosipho Lavuta, Lakeside, Joanesburgo, 2007
Katlego Mashiloane – a player for the Chosen FEW soccer team – and her partner Nosipho Lavuta entrust their intimacy to Muholi. The photographs reveal the complicity and affection of the couple, as well as the reality of their everyday surroundings. The basin bath and candles make up for the lack of electricity. The brick wall represents the architecture typical of South African townships. The wood stove, commonplace in houses during apartheid, served both to keep warm and as a comfort.
(Brave Beauties)
“Many people went to Muntu’s funeral. I met some friends, ex-friends, ex-boyfriends and ‘frenemies’. Muntu’s funeral brought people together. (Re)connected relationships and helped some to make new friends. It reminded me of how colorful and stylish the queer black community of South Africa is”, Lesiba Mothibe for the Inkanyiso website.
Brave Beauties, Durban, 2020
The presence of black LGBTQIAPN+ people on South African beaches is a confrontational gesture directed at apartheid hierarchy. During the regime, non-white people were forbidden from visiting beaches and other public spaces. In Durban, a 1997 council determined that white people (22% of the local population) would have exclusive access to 2,100 meters of beach, while black people (46% of the population) were allowed access to just 650 meters. Desegregation of the beaches began in 1989 and continues until today.
Busi Sigasa, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2006.
Busi Sigasa was the first person to participate in the Faces and Phases series. Poet, activist and survivor of “corrective” rape, Sigasa was photographed in front of the Constitution Hills Women’s Prison in Braamfontein. The 1909 building was known for holding activist women who stood against apartheid and separated prisoners according to race, offering better conditions to white women. Activists Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and Albertina Sisulu were held there.
Sigasa wrote the poem “Remember Me When I’m Gone…”, in which she celebrates her life and those of all the people who died due to prejudice and crimes against the LGBTQIA+ community. Sigasa died eight months after participating in this session.
Faces and Phases Brasil
Zanele Muholi was here in São Paulo from October to November 2024 to visit institutions and shelters for the black and LGBTQIAPN+ community. Among others, they visited Casa Chama, Casa Um and the Museum of Sexual Diversity, 9 de Julho Occupation, and the Museu Afro Brasil Emanoel Araujo. They also met with the group Trans Powers, organized by employees of the Instituto Moreira Salles. The aim of these meetings was to meet artists and activists, strengthen the fight for policies related to race and gender in both South Africa and Brazil.
The meetings resulted in photographs and videos presented for the first time in this exhibition.
Miss Lesbian VII, Amsterdam, 2009
The fluidity of the representation of genders is often visible in Zanele Muholi’s self portraits. In Miss Lesbian VII, the Miss outfit is combined with weightlifting poses, a sport typically seen as masculine. Resisting conforming to a single gender, either masculine or feminine, is an important part of the struggle for Muholi and the LGBTQIAPN+ community.
- Somnyama Ngonyama
“This series is my way of creating and activating a space of photographic shelter”
Bester V, Mayotte, 2015
In this series of self portraits, Muholi embodies their mother, Bester, a housekeeper who took care of the homes of white South Africans for 42 years. Muholi faces the camera wearing just a crown of steel wool sponges. The crown, made from a domestic object that symbolizes servitude, is a reminder that, for their employers, the identity of housekeepers is a condition of their utility – a familiar reality for many black Brazilian women.
Basizeni XI, Cassilhaus, 2016
In this self portrait taken during a residency in Cassilhaus, North Carolina, Muholi adorns herself in deflated bicycle tyres collected from a recycling depot. This work pays homage to her sister, Basizeni Muholi, who died in 2016, the same year as the photo. This image also makes reference to the millions of people who lost their lives in rubber mining in Congo from 1885 to 1924, during the reign of Leopold II of Belgium.
Faces and Phases
“My wish is for people to stop in front of the photo and ask themselves about their own existence, as mothers and brothers and sisters and parents, to say: how would I act if something inappropriate happened to my child?”
Zanele Muholi