Colbert Mashile has established himself as one of South Africa’s most unique and exciting contemporary artists. He has developed a unique iconographical language within South African art, often dealing with the mystical, mythological and archaic elements of traditional African culture and its legacy on present-day life.

Mashile has established a style, technique and iconography that are uniquely his own. Using acrylic water paints and charcoal, he has become known for his earthy colours, precise draughtsmanship, and witty and idiosyncratic compositions that combine animal characters and human figures – often in apparently equal-status exchanges. His art is full of commentary on social and political issues – between the rural and urban, Western and African, physical and spiritual, beautiful and ‘ugly’.