Neo Matloga’s new solo exhibition is about resilience – not the kind we shout about, but the quiet kind. The kind found in small rituals, in the decision to show up again. These are portraits of everyday courage.
For his first exhibition in Johannesburg since 2020, Matloga presents a tableau of quiet figures witnessed in moments of daily life between Johannesburg and Mamaila, the village where he grew up. The artist describes his paintings as “psychological landscapes,” in which the range of emotions comprising the everyday is captured on a spectrum, from love to exasperation and reverence. Whereas Matloga’s first exhibition, Back of the Moon, referenced scenes from local soap operas, plays, and family albums, Tomorrow is Another Day relinquishes theatricality, emphasising stillness and familiarity alongside the equal measures of presence and dignity these evince.
Working across painting, collage, and monotype printmaking, Matloga is drawn to the varied gestural markings these materials produce. He sees ink, charcoal, and fast-drying paints as implements that demand presence and urgency, adding a temporal stake to his practice. The artist explains: “That urgency mirrors the rhythm of photography: the single frame, the fleeting breath. But where photography captures a moment, painting chases it. I try to hold that breath a little longer, painting as if the camera were embedded in the pulse of my hand.”
Through scale, Matloga's figures impose upon the viewer. Their pointed gaze, extending beyond the frame, dispels any assumed passivity of the individual depicted, who is looked at but rarely looks back. The splintering of perspective is further heightened by his collaged approach, in which the mediums elucidate different gestures and tones. His depiction of hands, collaged onto the canvas using monotype prints, draws attention to the specificity of body language in each scene. Across these figures, emerging from all walks of life, Matloga reflects on the politicisation of the hands as an allegory for labour, comfort, and access.
Matloga recounts the storytelling he grew up with in Mamaila, which interwove gesture, myth, and ritual, as key to his overall practice. His paintings seek a balance between this mode of sharing and moments experienced in both intimate and public settings. The slippages in materiality and the play with proportions in these works reflect this interweaving of the real and abstract, leading to a new depiction of the mundane, guided by feeling.
Tomorrow is Another Day is about resilience—not the kind we shout about, but the quiet kind. The kind found in small rituals, in the choice to show up again. To compose yourself one more time, even when no one is watching. These are portraits of everyday courage: stories that live beneath the surface, held together by the quiet yet powerful belief that tomorrow still holds something for us.
More information here.
