JAG1994-7-13

Mancoba studied at the Grace Dieu Anglican Missionary Church School in Pietersburg (now Polokwane), and this is where he first learnt to carve. When the Anglican Sisters left Grace Dieu, some went to Manzini, Swaziland, and took the Bantu Madonna with them. Mancoba was born in Turffontein (some sources say Boksburg), in the then-Transvaal in 1904, and died in 2002 an Paris, France. He was greatly inspired by two fellow artists namely Lippy Lipshitz ( 1903 - 1980) and Irma Stern ( 1894 - 1966 ). He loved sculpting and completed various commission works for different churches. In 1938, he left South Africa to study art in Paris. In Paris he met Danish artist Sonja Ferlov (1911 - 1984 ) who he later married. He preferred to work in watercolour and only did his first oil painting in 1940. In 1952, he stopped producing sculptures and concentrated on painting. In 1961, he became a French citizen and in 1994 after an absence of 56 years, he visited South Africa for the first time for his Retrospective exhibition in Johannesburg.