PRESS RELEASE
GITHAN COOPOO | TEARS NOW BUT HEAVEN TOMORROW
Oct 15, 2025 – Oct 4, 2026
GITHAN COOPOO | TEARS NOW BUT HEAVEN TOMORROW | 15 OCTOBER 2025 – 4 OCTOBER 2026
NORVAL FOUNDATION, IN COLLABORATION WITH EVERARD READ, IS PLEASED TO PRESENT TEARS NOW BUT HEAVEN TOMORROW, A SOLO EXHIBITION HONOURING THE LIFE AND WORK OF GITHAN COOPOO
4 Steenberg Road, Tokai, Cape Town 7945
Opening reception: Wednesday 15 October 18.00
Walkabout: Sunday 2 November 11.00
Purchase your tickets for the opening reception via WebTickets
This exhibition honours the legacy of Githan Coopoo, a singular voice in contemporary South African art whose work redefined the possibilities of clay as both ornament and statement.
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Githan Coopoo (1994–2025) was a sculptor from Cape Town known for his brightly-coloured “false ceramics”—usually vases and handbags crafted from air-drying clay and adorned with his signature bold text—through which he explored queerness and both his Desi and coloured heritages.
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After starting to work with air-drying clay due to its accessibility, Coopoo became deeply invested in the medium’s porousness, with this inherent sensitivity coming to form an integral part of his artistic practice as a self-taught sculptor. Creating large sculptures out of air-drying clay presented particular technical challenges. Resisting pressures to switch mediums on the basis that it would make his art “eas[ier] to consume”, however, Coopoo saw the fragility of his work as reflective of our human capacity for vulnerability, and the necessity of a relationality rooted in patience and care.
- Ruth Ramsden-Karelse
Image courtesy of Sealand (photographer Paige Fiddes)
