wand bemalen motive

my name is esther mahlangu. i'm from emthambothini weltevrede, mpumalanga, kwandebele. i was taught to paintby my grandmother and my mother. i would continue to paintthe house walls when they left for a break. when they came back, they would say: "what have you done child?never do that again!" after that, i started drawingon the back of the house.

and slowly,my drawings got better and better, until they finally asked me to continue on the front of the house. then i knew i was good at painting. there is a strong theme across all the artof the ndebele people. the paintings, houses, vases and even the blankets all look similar. traditionally, we usedfive different soils to make paint.

the colours we had were red, black, orange, white and blue. we would then add cow dungto make the paint thick. but today we haveso many colourful paints available. i take great pride in all my work, because i want to keepmy culture alive for the children. the most important thingis that the artwork must catch your eye. i always wantto make something that looks beautiful. when i painted the bmw,

i used what was in my heart and mind. the painting was inspiredby our traditional ndebele designs. now people come from all over the world, like america and france. they come here to learnhow to draw and paint with me. painting is in my blood. nothing will ever stop mepainting and drawing. i will paint and draw until i die.