FAACCE Verified

Beaded Archive

Naledi Khumalo

Durban, South Africa

Medium: Glass beads, leather, brass
Dimensions: 90 × 60 cm
Year: 2023
Certificate: FA-2023-0207 →

$ 3,800

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Authenticated by the FAACCE Curatorial Council. View certificate.

Story behind the work

Each panel encodes a Zulu love-letter, the historic isishunka beadwork system in which colour and pattern speak where words may not. Khumalo restages the form as archive, refusing the souvenir reading the work has long suffered abroad.

Three hand-beaded panels stitched onto vegetable-tanned leather, framed in brass — a contemporary reassertion of an indigenous writing system.

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