Reginald Boateng, Emmanuel Chisenga, Segun Owolabi and Treasure Mlima reshape modern art with bold vision
Treasure Mlima wins top art honour for carved wood in SA
Emmanuel Tjiya | Sowetan October 13, 2026
Reginald Boateng (Ghana), Emmanuel Chisenga (Zambia), Segun Owolabi (Nigeria), and Treasure Mlima (South Africa) are the four breakthrough emerging visual artists to watch – reshaping modern art with a fresh perspective.
At the weekend, the quartet were given their stamp of approval by one of the continent’s leading Pan-African platform for emerging visual artists, Absa L’Atelier Art, which is celebrating 40 years of opening doors for young talent.
Mlima, 27, from Durban works primarily with carved wood and is the winner of the Absa L’Atelier Art Gerard Sekoto Award. Founded 18 years ago, the top honour is given to SA artists showing integrity and excellence in their work,
In addition to hosting a solo exhiibition and receiving R100,000 towards material costs, Mlima will embark on a three-month residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, France, from April to June 2027.
I’m still processing everything. It’s been a long journey of about five years, self-taught. I was en route to taking the traditional way of going to school, completing, going to university, then studying,” Mlima says.
“I’m a trained architectural draughtsperson, so when I graduated, I was underwhelmed with what I was going to do with this qualification and then I found my way doing art. With art it felt easy, it felt like I never needed to fight for it.
“I want to bridge a lot of depth within our society. I want to tackle race, social constructs and I want to get into sustainability by getting into sculpture and using discarded furniture.”
