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Temporary Exhibitions

UbuGqi beThongo

UbuGqi beThongo: A Solo Exhibition by Mzwanele Tshishonga
Exhibition Opening: 16 May 2026 | 11:00  | Wits Origins Centre, Johannesburg

UbuGqi beThongo is both a search and a rumination that started long before the
formal creation of this offering. This body of work, presenting ceramic and photographic material, emerges from a sustained and intimate engagement with ancient and contemporary local artistic practices, refracted through the lens of ubuGqi. UbuGqi is posited as a foundational philosophical framework, understood as a cosmic life force that permeates across realms and spheres, particularly in the onto-triadic conception of being. Existence is understood to encompass the interconnected spheres of the living, the
living-dead (ancestors), and the not-yet-born.

Ubugqi beThongo is submitted in partial fulfilment of the artist’s Master of Arts in Fine Arts degree at the Wits School of Arts. Mzwanele Tshishonga is a ceramist, researcher, and educator whose work bridges artistic practice, ancestral knowledge, and scholarly inquiry. His research and creative practice focus on the preservation and reimagining of African sculptural traditions, particularly through the lens of clay as a medium of healing, spiritual connection, and intergenerational knowledge transmission.

Exhibition Run: 16 May – 30 June 2026

Entrance is free on 16 and 18 May, thereafter R40/R70 (this gives full access to the museum and all temporary exhibitions).

Enquiries: bookings.origins@wits.ac.za; 0117174700

Artist details: Mzwanele Tshishonga tmzwanele@gmail.com / mzwanele.tshishonga@emafiniarts.co.za; +27 61 492 5791

Atlas of Uncertainty

Featuring 30 artists from Accra, Johannesburg, and Nairobi. This travelling exhibition that changes how we see African cities.
Atlas of Uncertainty is an interdisciplinary collaboration remapping migration and urban spaces across the continent — and showing what that means for the world’s future cities.
This is the exhibition where it all begins.

Atlas of Uncertainty is a project of the Oxford/Wits Mobility Governance Lab and the African Centre for Migration and Society.  atlasofuncertainty.com


Origins Centre, Wits University, Johannesburg
Launching 18 April 2026, from 10:00 till 15:00
RSVP for launch: sophie@frame45.com

List of artists (IG):

@aliceraymondartist
@hakopike
@anastasiapather
@nogoodangie
@askphotos_
@austineadika
@mack_a_bee
@motauboitumelo_art_days
@ok____yeye
@candicekramer
@wanjikukihato
@drcloveday
@yawcliff__
Daniel Muchina
@dela.anyah
@devolutionery_
@jupiteeerrr
@kiberaartsdistrict
Lebo Thoka
@manjahi_njoroge
@mareli.stolp
@onyismartin
@artsoulkojostudio
Neo Muyanga
@p_kamwathi
@seanokkai
@sebawali
@awo_tsegah
@theherd.studio
@wallace_juma
@wezileharmans

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Permanent Exhibitions

The interactive exhibits at Origins Centre take visitors on an extraordinary journey of discovery, which begins with the origins of humankind in Africa and then moves through the development of technology, art, culture, and symbolism. The journey continues with an exploration of the diverse Southern African rock art traditions. These ancient masterworks, and the artists, are illustrated through contemporary art installations by well-known South African artists.

Our permanent exhibitions:

  • Indigenous Gardens – edible and medicinal plants from different biomes that were used in the past and currently by ritual specialists throughout southern Africa.
  • African Origins - Early African stone tools from 2.6 million years ago; the origins of humanity in Africa and what makes us human; The sands of time across the world;  replica hominin skulls showing our human evolution over the last 7 million years
  • The San and Rock Art - San and their Hunter-Gatherer past; San genocide and Sara Baartman; The eland in San belief; San painting technologies; The trance dance and how San ritual specialists enter the spirit world; rain making and neuropsychology; Interpreting a rock art panel.
  • Rock Engraving Archive - Varied engraved rock art traditions & styles in Southern Africa. Can be explored through augmented reality (Download the app on Android or IOS – originscentrear)
  • Conservation - Conservation problems facing rock art sites today and site etiquette
  • Tapestry Room – Understanding and interpreting San Art; The history of the San told through 11 embroidered panels; The ‘White Lady of the Brandberg’
  • Khoe Art - The geometric art found in southern Africa; Who are the Khoekhoen?
  • Early (Iron Age) Farmers - The rise of complex societies, including information on Mapungubwe and Great Zimbabwe; Protest art of the Makgabeng
  • Installations by contemporary artists – One Being by Deborah Glencross; World Map by Walter Oltman; Axis Mundi by Russel Scott; Synanthrope by Hannelie Coetzee; Signs of people by Willem Boshoff; Threads of knowing by Tamar Mason; Double Vision by Pippa Scotness & Malcolm Payne; Glass Beads by Martli Jansen van Rensburg.
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