Sithwelenzim Bazalikazi

Abstract

SITHWELENZIMA BAZALIKAZI

“Sithwelenzima Bazalikazi series 2022” (we are struggling fellow mothers) is composed of photographs of staged performances of myself and sometimes with other women performing challenging mundane chores. Sithwele (we are carrying) nzima (heavy or difficult) Bazalikazi (mothers). Zala (verb = give birth) Nzima can also mean experiencing challenging problems, translated to mean carrying something heavy. The heaviness does not necessary refer to heavy material or physical load, but also emotional and spiritual. The women in these photographs are carrying buckets on their heads supposedly filled with water, heavy boxes characterising women’s struggles as providers, nurturers, and in this situation working and singing together symbolising solidarity. They are also walking in darkness portrayed by the moon and the stars, sometimes led by a heavily pregnant woman (the artist) as seen in “Sithwele nzima series 1, 2022”, a print which interprets/summarises this series. The episode portrayed in this series was a 10 kilometres journey to and from a waterfall in Kwazulu Natal (KZN) Province of South Africa. At the waterfall we performed a cleansing scene where we were immersed in water scooping and throwing it with the buckets metaphorically driving away all evils that surround us as black women in our respective habitats and daily living. These evils include gender-based violence (GBV) which leads to single or divorced women headed households.

The objective of this series was to highlight these struggles by appraising black women’s strengths as breadwinners even though this important responsibility is hardly recognised or is under acknowledge in our society. When the participants were asked to participate in this event, they were told that the buckets will be filled with essential food items, and after the event they will take them home. Their response was “whatever that is will help us feed our children”, and they participated diligently after being briefed about the objective and significance of the project. The 10-kilometre walk with heavy buckets on our heads epitomised black women day-to-day struggles for survival. Although we all knew we were going to a waterfall, but we were not aware of how far it was, but depended on our leader, and once we had started walking, we were determined to reach the waterfall. This determination is testimony to women’s strength which is usually overlooked, because women are said to be weak and just emotional beings. This belief is supported by patriarchal belief systems and several other socially constructed cultural norms. This is another distinguishing characteristic of women in general which make them achieve what they set out to do, and they sometimes achieve these outcomes without prior knowledge. An example is nurturing of children which they perform without a formula, if they are lucky to have mentors learn by seeing, or just by doing.

My initial plan as the artist was to perform with fellow women something that symbolised ordinary black women day-to-day chores especially those associated with women from rural areas, hence the water buckets. I had consciously envisaged a rural background where the July 2022 KZN floods had stricken. The waterfall was located near this environment, and when we were walking, we could still see the damage caused by the floods. The reason for this choice was to acknowledge the fact that once again the most affected people by these floods were black women from rural areas.

Thus, my work advocates for black women’s/mothers’ struggles which are not acknowledge and sometimes are used to discriminate them by silencing them through accepted cultural norms. My performance deliberately portrays me as an ordinary woman because I have experienced all these struggles in one way or another, and revoking them is not only showing my strength, but appraising this unacknowledged phenomenon, giving the women represented their deserved agency. Set within intersectional feminism my work seeks to not only appraise these women’s struggle but to showcase them towards a transformative change. My artworks are meant to be a beam of hope and optimism for the younger generation encouraging the youth in general (girls and boys equally) to reconsider and choose to live their lives and cohabit in respect with one another.