Farai Engelbrecht known by his artistic pseudonym Samurai Farai, graces our March cover in collaboration with Nando’s Creativity. Over the years his captivating style of artwork has garnered great attention from his wall murals, A-Reece’s “Today’s Tragedy, Tomorrow’s Memory: the mixtape” art cover, collaborating with Mercedes Benz to create a 3-D moving art piece that was showcased at Black Coffee’s Grammy award winning dinner and at Comic-Con, to doing a live illustration at the most recent Cotton Fest JHB

“I was always sensitive, always emotional, always creative that’s when it kinda hit me that I was always gonna be like this”

Although he’s 26 today, young Samurai discovered visual expression to be the gateway to communicating the complex inner being that makes up his psyche with the external world . “At around the age of 13 or 14 I kinda knew that I was different. I was always sensitive, always emotional, always creative that’s when it kinda hit me that I was always gonna be like this,” he says. His contemporary style of creating art is a fusion of cubism and neo-expressionism. Through his artwork, he channels what being a “Samurai” means to him, expressing sensitivity, discipline, and mindfulness.

Watch The Full Samurai Farai Interview

As human beings, we are multi-dimensional. What we show the world doesn’t sum up to what’s truly going on internally, which can lead us down the rabbit hole of struggling with mental health, something everyone struggles with but in different degrees. To navigate all that’s happening beneath the surface is through self-introspection, vulnerability and challenging yourself. Samurai’s art is based on displaying different sides of human identity. Present in his artwork are intense layers, disfigured physical features often appearing in multitudes as well as an array of colors which are his way of normalizing the conversation about mental health. He described art as “the only thing that I could do that brought me ease and satisfaction in my life”.

“I want to own my creativity”.

It’s not everyone who questions the norm and certainly not everyone that travels the road less travelled. “I want to own my creativity” he said with great confidence. Samurai is an independent contemporary artist whilst being the co-founder of Split Paint Studio’s Gallery and curator. The artist graduated from Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town where he majored in Printmaking. Talking about challenging the status quo, “If everybody I’m studying with is going to showcase in a gallery, I want to question why they’re not being independent, I want to ask them question as to why they don’t have the idea or agency to create their own gallery space,” he said.

Samurai Farai has expanded his offering from just artwork, recently combining visual expression with functionality. He introduced merchandise that includes t-shirts as well as interior pieces that include tufted rugs and chairs. There’s great anticipation for what’s next for the contemporary artist given all that he’s achieved in his career already.