Chief

Edward Chiwawa

Edward Chiwawa (born 1935) comes from the Shona Kore people in a district northwest of Guruwe about 150 kilometers from Harare. He first worked as a carpenter. Since 1967 he learned sculpture from his cousin Henry Munyaradzi. From 1970 to 1973 he lived in the artists' village of Tengenenge, after which he moved to the working-class suburb of Chitungwiza, south of Harare. His wife Sherita (a sister of Henry Munyaradzi), his daughters and his sons Cragemia and Macloud are independent artists and work in his workshop. Edward Chiwawa is one of the best known representatives of the first generation of modern Zimbabwean sculptors. Basic motifs for him are aspects of the universe such as the sun and the moon, to which he gives serious human faces with geometrically shaped features. His famous "Moonheads" made of serpentine or opal radiate a fascinating magic in their abstraction. Unlike some younger sculptors who see stone only as a material, Chiwawa - like many 'first generation' sculptors - leaves stone its dignity. "The stone speaks for itself," he said.

Exhibitions

Since the 1980s Edward Chiwawa participated in many international exhibitions. Already in 1987 and again in 1996 he won the 1st prize of the "International Exhibition of Small Format Sculpture" in Budapest. Edward Chiwawa had his own exhibitions in London (1981), Frankfurt am Main (1985), Sydney (1986), as well as in Melbourne, Rome and Paris in 1987.