Death threats don’t scare shock artist

AYANDA Mabulu isn’t bothered by the death threats he has received – the controversial artist remains unrepentant and determined to shock.

“I’ve received a few death threats from some ‘big men’ who are hiding in that black, green, and gold institution. I couldn’t give a f**k about them.” he said yesterday in an expletive-laden interview.

The death threats were spurred by his latest painting “The Economy of Rape” which depicts President Jacob Zuma performing a sexual act on former president Nelson Mandela.

The Nelson Mandela Foundation said it found the painting “distasteful”. The ANC called it “grotesque, inflammatory and in bad taste”, while many South Africans took to social media, labelling it crude and offensive.

But Mabulu, 36, maintains he was expressing his views on the situation in the country.

“I didn’t create the painting so that people can agree with me. I did the painting because I wanted to comment on an issue that is happening. The painting is about the continuous bulls**t, ill-treatment and disrespect that continues to happen to the people of this country.”

The Johannesburg artist is no stranger to controversy. He courted trouble last year when he painted Zuma performing a sexual act with controversial businessman Atul Gupta in a cockpit of an aircraft.

Mabulu hit out at critics who labelled him an attention seeker. “Why is it that when you are a black artist and you have an opinion, you become an attention seeker?” he asked.

“There is no way that I will ever keep quiet. I can’t sit there and be comfortable knowing what this government is doing to this country.”

Of Zuma, he said: “I’m not going to try and be nice to him because he’s occupying a certain office in the land.”

Mabulu said he was trying to “liberate the minds of my people, to remind my people where they belong, and that they belong in a better place than this, a place where we all can live peacefully and respect one another, with no hierarchy”.