The Tomorrows/Today cash prize, supported by Fiera Milano Milano Exhibitions Africa, is a South African visual art prize awarded to the most exciting emergent and under-represented artists. It is presented at the Investec Cape Town Art Fair (ICTAF) each year and this year, it has been awarded to Mafikeng-born multidisciplinary artist, Boemo Diale. The R80 000 prize acknowledges a burgeoning art career, and is awarded to an artist whose body of work is captivating in the present, and will likely be so in future.
Twenty-three year old Diale was one of the youngest amongst the participating artists at this year’s ICTAF. Diale’s work explores themes such as queer identity and spirituality while centering on introspection and healing. Diale’s work was selected by an international jury led by Tomorrows/ Today Italian curator, Dr Mariella Franzoni based between Spain and South Africa, Zeitz MOCAA Curator Tandazani Dhlakama and Heba El Kayal, an independent curator and researcher based between Cairo and London.
Diale being honored with the prestigious Tomorrows/Today Prize celebrates the promising trajectory of her artistic journey and career. It acknowledges not only the captivating nature of Diale’s current body of work but also its potential to resonate profoundly in the future. Diale is represented by Kalashnikovv Gallery which made her and the gallery the winners of Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2024 Tomorrows/ Today section among artists from 12 different galleries and projects from all over the world, including South Africa, Europe, and the US where 30 000 people got to experience the fair as a whole.
Image courtesy of Artsy
Tomorrows/ Today provides a platform for emerging and underrepresented artists and acts as a forecast of future relevant practices and ideas. Titled ‘Inhabiting the Wild’, the 2024 edition of Tomorrows/ Today explored and reimagined the concept of wildness through artistic imagination. According to Franzoni, this theme was suitable for the way it gets rid of the dualities that inform our way of thinking. Further, ‘wildness’ is the most unbound and unconstrained way to live, and so is a way of thinking that is broad enough for different artists to respond to. To this end, the Tomorrows/ Today curated section has grown exponentially and was much bigger at this year’s Fair under this theme which means more artists got to explore their art under this broad umbrella of a theme.
