Artists / Khathala Nkomo
Khathala Nkomo
Beyond the Body
Performance · with Toyin Lief Berwanger and Luzi Mika Nico Rademacher · 2025/2026 · World Premiere
Khathala Nkomo, Toyin Lief Berwanger, Luzi Mika Nico Rademacher, Beyond the Body, 2025/2026. Performance.
About the Work
Beyond the Body This performance piece was created during Khathala Nkomo's residency at Künstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral – in collaboration with Toyin Lief Berwanger and Luzi Mika Nico Rademacher. The piece emerged through collaborative writing, movement, and sound composition. Over the course of a year, the three artists, under Khathala Nkomo's direction, created a space where identity becomes fluid and resistance transforms into powerful performance art.
The project is rooted in a profound artistic exchange between queer creatives from South Africa and Germany—two countries with very different yet intertwined histories of queerness, visibility, and activism. How do queer bodies carry memories—especially in contexts where their stories have been erased, ignored, or distorted? The trickster, a figure present in both African and European mythologies, becomes the central symbol: shapeshifter, boundary-crosser, and troublemaker. In "Beyond the Body," the trickster emerges as a queer strategy—playful, unstable, political—enabling transformation, humor, ambiguity, and the rejection of categorization.
Imagine being able to see beyond masks, mirrors, and shame, and having the power to define your own creativity, to live your dreams. Imagine being seen beyond your physical form, without having to explain yourself. A world premiere!
About the artist
Khathala Nkomo
Khathala Nkomo is a facilitator, performer, trainer, and theatre maker. After graduating with a degree in speech and acting from UCT, she completed a three-year dance program with Jazzart and Phenduka Dance Company and finished the 'Artist in Schools' facilitator course at CATHSSETA. She has worked with theatre groups and township schools, using art as a means of personal reflection and development.
She began her career in 2015 at Wits as part of Drama for Life's Mvuso Schools and Community Education Projects and was one of the directors at the Soweto Theatre Schools Set Work Festival. In 2019, she joined the DFL Playback Theatre Company and founded the Isegazini Theatre Group in Soweto, South Africa. Later, she collaborated on projects such as "Re-Imagining Riverlea" with the Market Theatre Laboratory and mentored in Timbuktu's PopUp(non)School program. Community is central to her work – she inspires, empowers, and supports people, especially young people.
