“Ekphrasis for a Veiled Dream” in Portia Zvavahera: I’m with You. Cape Town: Stevenson, 2017.

Portia Zvavahera: I'm with You traces the Zimbabwean artist's work from 2013 to early 2017, encompassing her major series I Can Feel It in My Eyes (2015) and What I See Beyond Feeling (2016). Generous reproductions of her paintings on canvas and paper are prefaced by an essay by Nomaduma Rosa Masilela, 'Ekphrasis for a Veiled Dream'. Masilela combines vivid descriptions of Zvavahera's expressive figuration and rich colouration with accounts of her process, media and formative encounters with artists and teachers, concluding: 'Zvavahera's paintings weave mercurial relations between print and paint, line and form, and in their opacity expose the close relation between the intimate and the universal.'

(Above quote from Stevenson).

© 2025 Nomaduma Rosa Masilela