Joe Mutasa

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“Like they say-an apple does not fall far from the tree; my sculptures are mostly centered around everyday life of my people, the environment and my family life. Sharing ideas wit others has expanded my vision, my thoughts and my creativity”.

Born in 1964, in Rusape, a small town in the North East of Zimbabwe, Mutasa maintains that he was born an artist. Art was always his favorite subject at school; he would be the one who was chosen to do the maps and charts for the classroom. To this day he still uses the charts he drew.
After he completed school he enrolled in college to study Public Relations, a career he would give up as he decided to follow his heart and take up sculpting as a full time occupation. Mutasa’s older brother Gregory was working for a local company, (African Art Promotions), where he was carving representational Verdite busts and animals. It was through his exposure to his brother’s work that Joe began to work in stone. Realistic heads and animals were to form the majority of Joe’s work for his first four years as a sculptor. His medium was almost exclusively Verdite, the hard, green semi-precious stone, unique to Zimbabwe. The skill required to work in Verdite should not be underestimated, as it is one of the toughest and demanding of stones. This solid technical background is very obvious in his work today; he has the ability to dominate most stone, and has assumed the position as Master over his medium. Mutasa, however, became bored with realism and increasingly more interested in the portrayal of a feeling or emotion from within. His desire to express what he felt finally caused him to stop working Verdite and to go in search of something new.

His quest led him to Chapungu Sculpture Park, when in 1987; he began to work with a group of sculptors who had assembled there. This was before the Artists Residency Programme had been formalized, but the since the inception of Chapungu there have always been sculptors working at the Park. Other members of the group included Colleen Madamombe, Agnes Nyanhongo and Samson Kuvhenguwa. It was Kuvhenguwa who inspired Mutasa to become more serious about the expression of one’s inner feelings while he also encouraged Mutasa to do his best at all times.

Today Mutasa prefers to work in very large, very hard Springstone and has developed an intense understanding of form, space and harmony.