Xolela Madlanga, also known as Boss Lady Eternal is a Cape Town born visual artist and business owner currently living in Port Elizabeth. She specializes in emotive prints, body art and graphic design.
Her artwork is heavily influenced by
African textile, patterns and symbolism, which she uses to express her interpretation of the human condition. The main objective of her work is to express emotions that one might not be able to explain or describe easily. Simply put,
“what emotions look like”.
Xolela loves working on different mediums but favours paper and pen as it is how her art journey began. She began her journey in an Arts and Culture class in grade 9, after learning about how the Ndebele people develop the patterns found in their homes.
After a pattern making assignment,
she began doodling random prints and patterns to keep awake in class, concentrate or just keep her mind engaged. This developed from random doodles, to meaningful and more refined artwork.
In 2016, a model she was working with during the first Nelson Mandela Bay
Fashion week asked if she could do the art on her face for a photoshoot. After that, more opportunities came up to do body art. It was a complete struggle in the beginning as she was unfamiliar with using a paintbrush to do prints on people, more familiar with the control of a pen or a marker. However, through much trial and error, she eventually harnessed the skill, found the right tools, materials and techniques to make it work.
In 2018 an opportunity came up for PE
creatives to show case their work, it was at this time she decided to explore the idea of digitizing her designs and creating framed artwork.
xolela madlaanga
The great thing about patterns and print is that one design can be manipulated into multiple unique designs that can each mean different things. That is a reference to life in some way, there are multiple ways to perceive situations and there are many ways things can turn out. It all depends on the direction we or those around us choose to take.
Her work has been transpose onto t-shirts, jackets, sneakers, ceramics and murals. Her first mural sits at a residence at the
Nelson Mandela University and she wishes to do more in the coming years. Xolela believes that art brings joy into the world and loves experiencing that joy when people buy a piece of her work or get to be painted either for a photoshoot or just at an event.
Even though she draws inspirationon from African influences which make use of colour (cultural references), Xolela chooses to work in black and white. She feels that it allows the viewers to better interpret the work for themselves. Where she’s more comfortable using color is when working on human canvases. Her latest influences include the LauNYC, Karobo Poppy,
Baba Tjeko, Muusonda and Lulasclan.
In recent years she’s worked with some of her favourite PE creatives and models including Gugu Peteni, Khangelani Kota, Kisometsi Qadu, Sihle Suntele, Keratilwe Meela, Siphosihle Blanket,Tendai and many others.
