Sthenjwa Luthuli was born in Botha’s Hill in 1991 and attended ThornwoodSecondary School in KwaNdengezi near Marianhill. He was introduced to the idea of art as a career when he took part in visual art classes in 2010, and this encouraged him to further explore and develop his creativity.
For Luthuli, school and an education system premised on fear was challenging and he found peace in art. In this way, he realized that his fear was a result of the way his family and the people around him had grown up.
In 2011 he enrolled for the Velobala Saturday art classes hosted by the African ArtCentre at the Durban University of Technology. The Velobala programme is a renowned residency that ran from 1995 to 2015 that has nurtured many of Durban’s current generation of career artists and their classes offered visual art instruction and fine arts education to young artists located away from urban clusters of arts infrastructure. As a result of his commitment and overt talent, Luthuli was selected to then take part in the Velobala mentorship program in 2012. This mentorshipexposed Luthuli to a more intensive visual art program in a formal environment in the Department of Fine Art at the Durban University of Technology (DUT). Here hewas mentored by Themba Shibase, an artist and DUT fine art lecturer.
Luthuli draws inspiration from a number of artists including Ai Weiwei, WangechiMutu and Yinka Shonibare. His unique work originates from the woodcut print training he received at the BAT Centre where the blocks were carved to be used for printing. His large-scale works are MDF panels that are hand carved and painted, and presented as one-off works with startling texture and optical illusions of movement through pattern and relief. In recent years his practice has evolved into sculpture works and large–scale walk-through installations constructed from his carved panels.
Since 2011 he has participated in numerous exhibitions in Kwazulu–Natal, Johannesburg, Cape Town and abroad, including London. In 2012 he participated inexhibitions in Bremen, Germany and completed a mural project in the Concordia Tunnel, which is part of the international Collection of the Leiterin der stadtischenGalerle in Bremen.
In 2017 he was selected to take part in a 3-month residency in Bremen and in the same year was awarded runner-up in the national Sasol New Signatures competition and also selected to take part in a show curated by the National ArtBank of South Africa at Oliewenhuis Museum in Bloemfontein.
In 2019 Luthuli was invited by KZNSA Gallery to exhibit at Latitudes Art Fair. The fair’s founders selected one of Luthuli’s works, Izwi Lenhloko for all the branding and publicity of the fair, and the work was visible on city-wide street pole advertisements and banners, on fair signage and on the fair’s web banner and catalogue cover. In the lead–up to the fair, Luthuli was also invited to be part of a collaboration with David Krut print studio in which a print work that he developed would be released as a limited-edition folio and, in partnership with Daytona, be used to wrap a McLaren luxury car for VIPs at the fair. Luthuli sold out at the fair with all works going to prestigious collections.
Luthuli is represented by Unit London in the United Kingdom and WHATIFTHEWORLD Gallery in South Africa. In 2025 The Norval Foundation in Cape Town, in partnership with WHATIFTHEWORLD, mounted an extensive solo of Luthuli’s work titled, Umkhangu | Birthmark.
Luthuli’s work can be found in numerous museum, corporate and private collections internationally.
AWARDS
- 2017 – Third Prize at the KZNSA Members’ Award
- 2017 – Runner-up in Sasol New Signatures competition
- 2013 – Ernest Mancoba art workshop award
- 2010 – Outstanding student for 2010 visual art class – BAT Centre
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
- 2025 – Umkhangu | Birthmark; Norval Foundation, Cape Town
- 2023 – Inzalo Yelanga; Unit London Gallery, London, UK
- 2022 – Imbewu Yokhokho | The Seed of Our Ancestors; Gallery1957, Ghana
- 2021 – Umthente Uhlaba Usamila; BKhz Gallery Johannesburg
- 2021 – Imfumbatho | Bloodline; Unit London Gallery, London, UK
- 2020 – Inkaba Yami; WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
ART FAIRS
- 2022 – Expo Chicago, USA
- 2022 – Investec Cape Town Art Fair, SA
- 2021 – AKAA Art Fair, Paris, France
- 2021 – Miami Art Fair, USA
- 2020 – PRIZM Art Fair, Miami (online)
- 2019 – Latitudes Art Fair, Johannesburg
- 2015 – Turbine Art Fair, Johannesburg
COLLECTIONS
- Museum collections
- Brooklyn Museum, USA
- Norval Foundation, Cape Town
- Phansi Museum, Durban
- National ArtBank, Bloemfontein
- Leiterin der stadtischen Galerle, Bremen
University collections
- Unisa University, South Africa
- University of Pretoria, South Africa
Corporate Collections
- Standard Bank, South Africa
- Sasol, South Africa
- FNB Umhlanga, South Africa
- Pick ‘n Pay, South Africa
- Metropolitan Insurance, South Africa
- Nandos, South Africa
Private collections
Luthuli’s work can also be found in private collections in South Africa, Switzerland, Australia, the UK and Swaziland
