York's Shona Gallery
The
Blog
Stories of the artists and peoples behind the work: the sculptors, tribes, and traditions that have shaped our collection.
Richard Mteki
Richard Mteki was born in 1947 in Harare, Zimbabwe, the younger brother of the celebrated sculptor Boira Mteki. Growing up in proximity to one of the country's great artists planted...
Denny Kanyemba
Denny Kanyemba was born in 1965 and developed his practice at Tengenenge, the sculptural community that became one of the most important incubators of Zimbabwean stone-carving in the post-independence...
Coster Balakasi
Coster Balakasi was born in 1970 in Malawi and came to the Zimbabwean stone-carving tradition as an outsider, arriving from a neighboring country with its own sculptural traditions and finding...
The Makonde Tribe
The Makonde are an ethnic group indigenous to the Mueda Plateau of northern Mozambique and the Ruvuma region of southern Tanzania. Renowned across the world for their exceptional woodcarving tradition...
The Shona Tribe
The Shona are the largest indigenous group in Zimbabwe, comprising roughly 80 percent of the country's population and divided into five principal clans: the Karanga, Zezuru, Korekore, Manyika, and Nda...