DepartmentTextiles-Africa

Social Distance

NameWall hanging

Maker Selinah Makwana (African, born 1959)

CultureAfrican

Date2020

Place madeBrummeria, Winnterveldt, SOUTH AFRICA, Africa

MediumCotton, thread

Dimensions40 3/16 × 40 15/16 in. (102 × 104 cm)

Credit LineInternational Folk Art Foundation. FA.2020.58.1

Object numberFA.2020.58.1

ProvenanceCurator commissioned from the artist.

DescriptionSubjects in distinctive panels: Cooking-depicts two people wearing masks sitting on a couch, a woman behind them is cooking in a kitchen, and a young girl wearing a mask is entering from a door; Lock Down-depicts a white airplane with "South Africa" a woman with a child in a sling on her back, and the inscription "Super Maize Men and many more"; R.I.P-depicts a funeral with a coffin at the center.

Selinah Makwana, a talented member of the Mapula Embroidery Trust
in the Winterveldt region of South Africa, created this embroidered
story cloth titled Social Distance to illustrate her community’s
experiences with COVID-19. It depicts common sights during the
coronavirus lockdown: families staying home, news reports on public
health and safety, food relief, the daily presence of PPE, and, most
tragically, crowded cemeteries (from exhibition label text).