Single-arm flair on the Pommel Horse (mid light), 2026

In Mary Sibande’s latest collaboration with the David Krut Workshop (DKW), the artist continues to expand the visual universe of her alter ego, Sophie. The series consists of 8 watercolour monotypes and their ghosts, continuing Sibande’s iconic use of blue in “The peephole series” 

“We, the viewers, are observing Sophie engaged in leisurely activities, but our gaze is mediated, restricted through a peephole. The peephole becomes a device of control and distance; it limits what we can see while heightening our sense of curiosity and intrusion. It suggests secrecy, surveillance, and a quiet violation of privacy, placing us in an uneasy position between passive observer and active voyeur. 

A new softness is emerging, a shift toward an imagined sense of leisure. 

These are prints, works on paper. I placed Sophie’s leisurely activities on paper intentionally. 

There’s something about paper that feels intimate, almost like a postcard that says, wish you were here, a snapshot of a place, a mood, an experience. A piece of paper you can take home that will later become a memory. 

In these works, Sophie is seen doing things she was once denied as a Black woman during apartheid, resting, dreaming, finding joy in the everyday. 

She refuses the boundaries that institutions once used to restrict Black people’s access to freedom and leisure. In these works, she claims space for joy, for rest, for imagination. 

And that, in itself, is a radical act, to simply be.” 

Mary Sibande, 2026