House Painting

Ndebele House Painting

Ndebele mural designs communicate information about the family's identity, aspirations, desires and most importantly secret messages that could only be interpreted by those in the know. The sense of place was a political statement saying you may have stolen our lands and homes but we are on the landscape and we are Here. This is particularly significant given the Ndebele were dispersed throughout the Transvaal in the 19th century following their defeat by the Boers.
The way you identify Ndebele is that it is unique to any other artform in the world that it has a black line separating one color from another, this style developed during the art deco period which is all based on the geometry of square; rectangle; triangle and circle.

Image Description

Photograph by Constance Stuart Larrabee, 1936-1949.

Ndebele Woman PaintingGatepost, 1936-1949. The woman is painting one of the ball-capped pillars at the entrance to the homestead area with a paintbrush and holding a tin container for the paint. She is wearing a long blanket over her shoulder, beaded neck, arm, and leg rings, and brass arm and leg rings.
Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art

Originally these painted designs, perceived by the white majority to be purely
decorative, but they were used by the Ndebele to communicate resistance
through a complex visual language known only to them. Still painted
today, these murals act as an affirmation of cultural identity