Exhibition & Launch: The Kousins

Strktly From My Kousins (2025). Graphic design by Simangaliso Sibiya

Exhibition & Launch: The Kousins

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Framer Framed is happy to announce the launch of The Kousins platform, as a continuation of the Decolonial Futures Cultural Exchange Programme. In 2020, Decolonial Futures began as a hybrid exchange with the Sandberg Instituut, the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Framer Framed and Funda Community College in Soweto, South Africa. The programme continued into a series of public programmes and symposium, reflecting on the processes of decolonisation within art education. The students from Funda soon became the mentors, taking the initiative to lead workshops and share their art practices ultimately asking ‘how do we remember and mourn? How do we dream and heal? How do we commit to action?’

Artist and cultural organiser, Simangaliso Sibiya kick started The Kousins Project, envisioned as a global resource for arts education and an artists’ index, rooted in the belief of collaboration. On 6 September 2025, Mandebele Photo Gallery in Braamfischerville, Soweto, will host the launch of The Kousins website alongside the opening of Striktly from my K.O.U.S.I.N.S, an exhibition that celebrates community, collaboration, and the radical potential of chosen family.

The Kousins is a new global digital platform for arts education, collaboration, and archiving, bringing together artists, cultural workers, and educators from Soweto, Amsterdam, and beyond. Developed through partnerships with Framer Framed and supported by local creatives, the platform serves as an artists’ index, an archive of collaborations, and a space for critical dialogue.

The exhibition takes its title from Tupac Shakur’s 1993 album, reimagined as a love letter to creative communities that transform what society discards—whether materials, memories, or people—into powerful expressions of value. Through paintings, photographs, mixed media works, and video, Striktly from my K.O.U.S.I.N.S reflects on the “rose that grew from the concrete” and asks: How can creative, and cultural workers build value around communities?

The launch event will coincide with the Mandebele Photo Gallery’s First Saturdays initiative, with an afternoon program of opening remarks, a live website reveal, exhibition walkabouts, and community engagement over music and light snacks.

Striktly from my K.O.U.S.I.N.S is a celebration of what is often overlooked or thrown away—physically, socially, and historically—reclaimed through creativity, collaboration, and kinship.

Opening Day

13:00 Doors Open
13:30 Opening Remarks
14:00 Official Website Launch
14:30Exhibition Walkabout
15:00 Music, Snacks, and Community Engagement

The exhibition will be accompanied by a month-long series of Wednesday programs, including:

10 September: Creating Sustainable Creative Spaces: Panel with cultural workers and industry experts on building long-term creative ecosystems.
17 September: Collectors, Curators, and Collections: Exploring the role of collecting in arts education and cultural development.
24 September: Heritage Day Walkabout: Engaging local schools and community members in a public holiday art tour.