A look into Lethabo Huma’s visual art journey
Art is personal because what lies at its core is everything embedded in the artist. Art is thoughts, trauma, emotions and memories that find rest on canvases. In addition, visual diary pages create room for conceptual ideas born from the artist’s reality. It is never just a painting or a drawing. It will never be just a film since it is an embodiment of its creator. We had the privilege of talking to digital artist Lethabo Huma about the personal journey that she has walked with her art.
Lethabo thinks she has grown immensely as an artist
Throughout the years, Huma has been her greatest teacher. When conceptualising, she sits down with herself and imparts words that function as the roots to her growth. In other words, her constant reminders to herself that what she exhibits and brings to life is for her. It does not exist for the external world or human opinion found in social media and the mind of (art) collectors. However, it has not been easy teaching this lesson since it is a challenging thing to grasp and apply every time one creates. In addition, Huma has seen her skill set improve since she first shared her work on Instagram. She believes that her lessons have allowed her to attain her goal of creating artworks that carry reality expressively.
When she looks at one of her earliest works
Lethabo thinks of how rigid she was in her process of working towards attaining particular styles of work. Huma is also slowly teaching herself to dive into the depths of art as well as the countless possibilities of how one’s work looks.
Her message to artists on their personal journey
‘Seeing other artists create fuels me; dive into what inspires you. Never stop learning. There is never enough that you can learn from other artists. Watch tutorials and if you have the means to, enroll into a short online art course. Make room for no limitations. Keep an unrestricted art space. Keep an art space that functions as your refuge; make it your safe space or happy place.’
See Lethabo’s work here: https://www.lethabohuma.com/.
