skeptical erections is a book of startling visual and verbal imagination. Sapeta’s poems are short narratives of survival – his own and those of others. In a graphic language style, the book creates a world of mistrust and skepticism, tinged with humour. Despite their distortions and traumas, the characters are treated with respect and compassion.
Mxolisi Dolla Sapeta was born in 1967 in New Brighton, Port Elizabeth/Gqeberha, where he still lives. He studied art through INTEC College and the Nelson Mandela University art school. He later taught art for six years at Port Elizabeth College, before deciding to try and make a living as a full-time artist. He has held 10 solo exhibitions and participated in many group exhibitions in South Africa and internationally. He has been involved for years in local art education, and in 2018 he founded the New Brighton Art School. In 2016 Sapeta did an MA in Creative Writing at Rhodes University.
He writes: “In my paintings and poems, I like to dig beneath the surface of social reflections and find what’s hidden behind the skirt of moral values. I continue to work every day in the middle of a vicious township. All my creative work has been developed here. There is a significant randomness here that is both violent and honest. I owe to this township every step back and forth of my creative work.”
