"N GCONO I HLWEMPU K UNESIBHANXO S ESITYEBI "

("Better Poor Than a Rich Puppet by Ayanda Mabulu, 2010 Better Puppet")

In "Ngconco Ihlwempu Kunesibhanxo Sesityebi" (Better Poor Than A Rich Puppet), Ayanda Mabulu shows key international and national figures acting out or being acted on around a dining table. We know them all.Among them, previous president George W Bush is garotting an ageing Nelson Mandela, Robert Mugabe is concentrating on driving a nail into his nose with a hammer and PW Botha is pointing that familiar stubby finger. US President Barack Obama is ironing his tongue, which Mabulu connects to the idiom of restructuring your tongue. He has portrayed President Jacob Zuma, wearing a part-wolf, part-sheep headdress, as the angel Gabriel with a prosthetic arm wolf, with which he pierces his chest with an arrow. He is shown naked, as is Anglican Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu. Mabulu has been questioned by people about this. To paint elders in such a fashion is considered extremely disrespectful and insulting. He says this is not a personal attack against Tutu, for he respects him as a father is figure, but more against the church. He rejects the criticism as not being relevant to his generation. Its time for change, he says. Cape Times Monday, November 8, 2010 In the painting, all of the figures are hindered or compromised: Jacob Zuma's penis is supported by a crutch. he According to Mabulu, this is a metaphor for the perception that Zuma's sexual escapades are out of control; the crutch implying he needs help to overcome the issue. Mabulu also explained that Bishop Tutu's tied up penis refers to a process during the Xhosa male initiation u ritual where the penis is covered to speed up the removal of the foreskin. Traditionally a sign of strength and power in his culture, the penis here is p portrayed as weakened, incapacitated and "colonised by Western colonised" values in pain just like during initiation. Asked whether he intended to offend, Mabulu said that he was merely painting his perception of the roles that the state and the church play in a poverty stricken environment. He added that if it offended anyone, it poverty was probably necessary for them to look at reasons why they felt this way. Asked whether painting a political and church leader naked was disrespectful, he said these figures are disrespectful of him and his people: they disrespectful can't expect respect if they don't respect the people they lead. http://worldart.co.za/news/