Goncalo Mabunda Maputo, Mozambique, b. 1975

Mabunda draws on the collective memory of his country, Mozambique, in particular its long and terrible civil war, working with dismantled arms recovered from the sixteen-year conflict that divided the region.

In his celebrated series of thrones and masks, Mabunda reassembles AK47s, rocket launchers, pistols and other weapons of destruction into symbolic pieces that critique political and military power systems and celebrate the long lineage and influence of traditional, tribal African arts. Denied their original function, the thrones and ceremonial masks are reconfigured, much like the materials from which they are made, into objects that honour the resilience and creativity of African civilian societies and the transformative power of art.
 
Exhibitions include the Gangwon International Biennale, South Korea, ‘All the World’s Futures’ at the 2015 Venice Biennale, ‘Making Africa’ at the Vitra Museum, Germany, 'Africa Now: Political Patterns' at the Seoul Museum of Art, The Past, The Present and the Inbetween, National Pavilion of Mozambique at the 2019 Venice Biennale, Ex Africa - Présences africaines dans l'art d'aujourd'hui, Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, France, Narrative Wisdom and African Arts at the Saint Louis Art Museum, USA and Reporting House, Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, Pristina, Kosovo among others.

His work has been acquired by Chazen Museum of Art at University of Wisconsin-Madison, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Brooklyn Museum, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Fondation H, Paris, the Vatican Museums, Vatican City and Saint Louis Art Museum.