Glimpses of the Now group exhibition showcases collage-based works from across the Global South

South African artist Sam Nhlengethwa’s celebrated artwork Glimpses of the 50s and 60s (2002/3), part of the esteemed Javett Family Collection, will be included in a landmark exhibition titled Glimpses of the Now, opening in London on 28 May 2025. Curated by Georgia Nasseh (Brazil), recipient of the prestigious BRIDGE Fellowship programme and Gillian Fleishmann (South Africa)—the exhibition is the result of a dynamic partnership between the Javett Art Centre at the University of Pretoria (Javett–UP) and The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities (TORCH) at the University of Oxford.

Glimpses of the 50s and 60s, a series of thirty lithographic collages by Nhlengethwa, reflects the tumultuous landscape of South Africa under apartheid. Completed in 2003, Glimpses of the 50s and 60’ brings together photographs from the artist’s family albums and photographs published in Drum, a renowned South African magazine that highlighted Johannesburg’s contemporary black urban culture and featured work by black photographers.

Collage has defined the work of influential South African artists throughout the twentieth century and has remained a defining feature of the work of contemporary artists across the Global South. The exhibition Glimpses of the Now places Nhlengethwa’s lithographic collages in conversation with works by six contemporary artists whose practices involve varied forms of collage-making: Alexia Ferreira (Brazil), Ethel Tawe (Cameroon /

United Kingdom), Gê Viana (Brazil), Neo Matloga (South Africa / Netherlands), Phumulani Ntuli (South Africa), and Thato Toeba (Lesotho / Netherlands).

Glimpses of the Now reflects on why the practice of cutting and pasting has emerged, in both the twentieth and twenty first centuries, as a preferred visual language—not previously afforded by the conventions of photography—for representing and re-presenting the experiences of apartheid and post-apartheid, racism and xenophobia, as well as individual and collective identities. The exhibition explores further how collage disrupts photography’s coloniality, allowing for the fragmentation and juxtaposition, the merging and colliding, of multiple photographic frames, conceptually and practically. 

The exhibition also showcases collages produced at workshops held at Javett–UP and at the University of Oxford with students and members of both universities’ broader communities.

The opening of the exhibition will be joined by Nhlengethwa, who will lead a walkabout with the curators exploring the relationship between photography and collage in the Global South.

Glimpses of the Now exhibition details

Dates: 28–31 May | Wed–Sat 11:00AM–6:00PM

Address: Four Corners, 121 Roman Road, London, UK E2 0QN

Free admission. Open to the public.

Exhibition Opening and Private View

28 May | 6:00–9:00PM

Talk with Sam Nhlengethwa

28 May | 7:00–8:00PM

About the Curators:

Georgia Nasseh is Research Fellow in the Literatures of the Global South at King’s College, University of Cambridge. Her PhD, completed in 2023 at the University of Oxford, explores multilingualism in twentieth-century Angolan literature. She is the recipient of the 24–25 BRIDGE Fellowship.

Gillian Fleischmann is an artist and cultural producer interested in curatorial practices. She has worked in various projects within the creative sector, from exhibitions to coordinating a film and publication. She has a BA in Fine Arts (Hons) from the University of the Witwatersrand and is the Curatorial Assistant at Javett–UP.