Available Works

About

Athi-Patra Ruga is one of the few artists working in South Africa today whose work has adopted the trope of myth as a contemporary response to the post-apartheid era. Ruga creates alternative identities and uses these avatars as a way to parody and critique the existing political and social status quo. Ruga’s artistic approach of creating myths and alternate realities is in some way an attempt to view the traumas of the last 200 years of colonial history from a place of detachment – at a farsighted distance where wounds can be contemplated outside of personalized grief and subjective defensiveness.

The philosophical allure and allegorical value of utopia has been central to Ruga’s practice. His construction of a mythical metaverse populated by characters which he has created and depicted in his work have allowed Ruga to create an interesting space of self reflexivity in which political, cultural and social systems can be critiqued and parodied. Ruga has used his utopia as a lens to process the fraught history of a colonial past, to critique the present and propose a possible humanist vision for the future.

Significant exhibitions and performances include: Kiss My Genders, Haywood Gallery, London; Ravelled Threads, Sean Kelly Gallery, Seattle; Art Afrique, Louis Vuitton Foundation, Paris; Over the Rainbow, Performa 17, New York; An Age of Our Own Making, Holbaek, Denmark; Queer Threads: Crafting Identity and Community, Boston Centre for the Arts, Boston; AFRICA: Architecture, Culture and Identity at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art; Imaginary Fact at the South African Pavilion, 55th Venice Biennale; African Odysseys at The Brass Artscape in Brussels; Public Intimacy at the SFMOMA, San Francisco; The Film Will Always Be You: South African Artists on Screen at the Tate Modern in London; and Making Africa at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao.

Recent projects include Ruga’s collaboration with Dior on designing two handbags for the fourth edition of the Lady Dior Art Bag. Ruga is also the co-founder of  Victory of the Word, a fundraising and development project in support of the historic Lovedale Printing Press in Alice, Eastern Cape, as well as the Artistic Director of BODYLAND, an incubator residency for artists held in the Amathole Village, Hogsback.

His works form part of Private, Public and Museum Collections in South Africa and abroad, namely: the Smithsonian Museum of African Art, Washington DC; the Foundation Louis Vuitton,  Paris; Fondation Gandur pour l’Art,  Geneva; The Zeitz MOCCA, Cape Town; Museion – Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Bolzano Italy; CAAC – Pigozzi Collection; The Wedge Collection; and the IZIKO South African National Gallery.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2020	iiNyanga Zonyaka, Norval Foundation, Cape Town
	Interior/Exterior / Dramatis Personae - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2018	Of Gods, Rainbows and Omissions, Somerset House, London
	Things We Lost In The Rainbow, Performance (in collaboration with The Institute of Creative Arts), Cape Town
2017	Queens in Exile 2014-2017 - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2016	Athi-Patra Ruga, Bass Museum of Art, Miami
2015	A Land Without A People… For A People Without A Land, In Situ, Paris
	The Elder of Azania, Grahamstown National Arts Festival, Grahamstown
2014	The Future White Women of Azania Saga - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2012	Ilulwane, Solo Presentation at Long Street Baths, Cape Town
2011	Ilulwane Performa 11, New York City, New York
2010	Teeth are the Only Bones that Show, WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
	Athi Patra Ruga: The Works, FRED Gallery, London, England
	The Body In Question IV: La Momma Morta, YOUNG BLACKMAN, Cape Town
2009	After He Left, YOUNG BLACKMAN, Cape Town
	Mister Floating Signifier and the Deadboyz, WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2008	..of bugchasers and watusi faghags, Art Extra, Johannesburg

Selected Group Exhibitions

2022	Material Echos WITW Amsterdam - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
	Seeds of the Fig - Twee Jonge Gezellen Wine Estate, Krone x WHATIFTHEWORLD, Tulbagh, South Africa
2021	This is not Africa - Unlearn what you have learned, ARoS Museum, Denmark
	RESTUDIO, Cunningham Contemporary, Johannesburg
2020	Matereality, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	Lumieres D’Afrique, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg
	Pretty Gucci Gorilla, with Kader Attia, Eternal Gallery, Tours, France
2019	Crossing Night: Regional Identities x Global Context, MOCAD (The Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit), Michigan
	Radical Love, Ford Foundation, New York
	Transamerica/n: Gender, Identity, Appearance Today, McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, Texas
	Not What You Want To See, Factoria Habana, Havana Biennale, Havana
	Kiss My Gender, Hayward Gallery, London
2018	Soft Power, Transpallete Center for contemporary Art, Bourges, France
	Dress Up, Speak Up: Costume and Confrontation, 21c, Louisville
	Africa State of Mind, New Art Exchange, Nottingham
	CLOSE, Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG), Johannesburg
	Ravelled Threads, Sean Kelly Gallery, Seattle
	The Fabric of Felicity, Garage Museum, Moscow
	Continental Drift, Cairns Art Gallery, Australia
	Embodied Politic, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago
2017	The BEATification of Feral Benga, Nordwind Performance festival, Berlin, Germany
	Afrotopia, Les Rencontres de Bamako, Bamako, Mali
	Dada Africa, Non-Western Sources and Influences, Musee de Orsay, Paris
	Everyday Anomaly - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
	Art Afrique, Louis Vuitton Foundation, Paris
2016	Queer Threads: Crafting Identity and Community, Boston Centre for the Arts, Boston
	Women's Work, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	An Age of Our Own Making, Holbaek, Denmark
2015	Studio: The Lives and Works of South African Artists, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	Foreign Bodies - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
	Queer Threads, Leslie & Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, New York
	Making Africa: A Continent of Contemporary Design, Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain
	Lumières d'Afriques, Theatre National De Chaillot, Paris
	Broken English, Tyburn Gallery, London
	2015 Joburg Art Fair - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg
	AFRICA: Architecture, Culture and Identity, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Louisiana
	The Film Will Always Be You: South African Artists on Screen, Tate Modern, London
	The Elder of Azania, Solo Performance at the Johannesburg Pavilion, 56th La Biennale di Venezia, Venice
2014	Uncertain Terms - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
	Brave New World...20 Years of Democracy, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	Public Intimacy, SFMOMA, San Francisco
	PRÓXIMO FUTURO / NEXT FUTURE, Programa Gulbenkian de Cultura Contemporânea, Lisbon, Portugal
	African Odysseys, The Brass Artscape, Brussels
2013	Films for Peace , Screened Worldwide including South Africa, Paris, London, New York, Sydney
	Sharp Sharp, Johannesburg, Gaite Lyrique, Paris
	The Beautyful Ones, Galerie Nolan Judin, Berlin
	Imaginary Fact, 55th La Biennale di Venezia, South African Pavillion, Venice
	Between the Lines, Braunschweig University of Art, Berlin
	Making Way: Contemporary Art from South Africa and China, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg
2012	A SHOT IN THE ARSE, The Michaelis Gallery, Cape Town
	Under a Tinsel Sun, The III Moscow International Biennale For Young Art, Moscow, Russia
	Neither Man Nor Stone, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	Making Way, in collaboration with Mikhael Subotzky, National Arts Festival, Grahamstown
2011	BECOMING: Photographs from the Wedge Collection, Nasher Museum of Art, North Carolina, USA
	A Tribute to Photography, Primo Marella Gallery, Milan, Italy
	Living as Form Exhibition, New York
2010	From Pierneef to Gugulective, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	For Those Who Live in It - Pop culture Politics and Strong Voices, MU Foundation, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
	DADA South?, IZIKO South African National Gallery, Cape Town
	X HOMES, Performance Art Series, Johannesburg
	Africa, Assume Art Position, Primo Marella Gallery, Milan, Italy
2009	A Life Less Ordinary; Performance and Display in South African Art, Djanogly Art Gallery, Nottingham, UK
	Beauty and Pleasure in Contemporary South African Art, Stenersen Museet, Oslo, Norway
	Infecting the City, Cape Town CBD
	Spot on Dak’Art
	2008 Retrospective, IFA Gallery, Berlin, Germany
	Pret a Partager (More than the sum of its parts), IFA Gallery, Stuttgart, Germany
	Big Wednesday, WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2008	Peripheral Vision and Collective Body, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Bolzano, Italy
	Disguise: The Art of Attracting and Deflecting Attention, Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town
	Upstairs/Downstairs, Association of Visual Arts, Cape Town
	The Trickster, Art Extra, Johannesburg

Art Fairs

1-54 London 2023

Awards

Selected Publications