Quite talented and world-renowned Ndebele artist Esther Mahlangu is at it again…
This time she has put her mark on the latest BMW 7-series.
Gogo Esther (81) first rose to prominence after she exhibited her Ndebele artwork during the Magician of the World exposition in 1989.
In 1991, she made international news when she was chosen by the car-maker BMW to design its entire 521i.
But now in 2016, gogo Esther appears again – this time designing the company’s latest luxury sedan interior.
The latest 740Li sedan will be displayed at the Frieze Art Fair in London between 5 and 11 October 2016 and organisers say the money made “will be donated for a good cause”.
Her story went viral on the social network on Wednesday.
Esther said: “The patterns I have used on the BMW parts marry tradition to the essence of the BMW. When the company sent me the panels to paint, I could see the design in my head and I started painting the small ones to get the feeling of the surface”.
She was born in 1935 in the Middelburg town of Mpumalanga and has painted since a very young age – having grown in a family of Ndebele artists – she is also set, in a few months, to design premium vodka brand Belvedere. She is also featured in Black-American musician John Legend’s MakeADifference campaign.
(edited by MLM)
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