Micha Serraf was born and raised in Zimbabwe and fled to South Africa when he was 9 years old. A fiction and performance-based photographer, Serraf aims for their work to be other-worldly yet familiar, soft and Afrofuturistic. Each body of work is the photographic documentation of a site-specific performance piece. With each location being a restricted no-access zone for various reasons. An example of this would be the South African National Defence Force Military Base.
Serraf has won multiple international awards including The Ritzau Art Prize, Pride Photo of the Year and being selected by Foam Magazine as 1 of the top 20 emerging artists from around the world for 2020.
In the mobility that has been a defining factor of his life, Micha has taken note of the behaviour of themselves and other foreign nationals in their navigation of post-apartheid South Africa. They display an acute awareness of what the safest shape they need to take on to survive particular contexts. This fluid presentation of self, and the ability to be malleable are tactics used to access acceptance and camouflage. In this exposure to several ways of existing, Micha has experienced and observed a variety of gender norms, enactments and ideologies. Micha seeks to dissect and dismantle the understanding of home and belonging within this configuration, demonstrating the evolutionary, fluid and emotional entanglements related to the purpose, interpretations and performance of gender, race and origin.
Micha attended the University of Cape Town, and completed his Honours Degree in Fine Art with a specialisation in Contemporary Photography. Micha's work has been featured in both local and international publications, exhibitions and media including that of the British Journal of Photography and i-D.
• Winner of the Ritzau Art Prize with ISCP & 1-54 Art Fair, 2021
• Published in the South African National Life Orientation Curriculum alongside
Zanele Muholi, 2021
• 1-54 Art Fair New York, 2021
• 1-54 Art Fair London, 2021
• Amsterdam Unseen Contemporary Photography Festival, Amsterdam 2021
• CHIPOKO Solo exhibition, Open24Hrs Gallery 2021
• Decade of Change group show with British Journal of Photography in New York,
2021
• Decade of Change group show with British Journal of Photography in Hong Kong,
2021
• Winner of the FastTrack 18 with the British Journal of Photography and 1854
Media, 2021
• British Journal of Photography shortlisted as top 20 photographers for WaterAid
commission, 2021
• Oath Magazine contemporary photography group show, 2021
• Selected by Foam Museum as the youngest top 20 emerging artist, 2020
• Paris Photo, Group Show, 2020 [Postponed Due to COVID-19]
• Foam Magazine Exhibition London Photo, 2020 [Postponed Due to COVID-19]
• European Month of Photograph in Berlin with C/O Berlin at Kuhlhaus, 2020
• Amsterdam Unseen Photography Festival with Foam Museum, 2020 [Postponed
Due to COVID-19]
• International Pride Photo Award for Best Single Image, 2020
• Africa Photo Awards Portraiture Finalist 2020
• Group Show, Studio Voop, South Africa 2020
• “To Thine Own Self Be True”, a Group Exhibition at Kelvin Corner Gallery 2019
• VSCO exhibition in London and New York pop up galleries 2018
• “GA MASAITSEWENG”, a Group Exhibition at The Slave Lodge Gallery, South
Africa 2018
• This Is Gender exhibition, Amsterdam
• Amsterdam Unseen Contemporary Photography Festival, Amsterdam
• VSCO exhibition in London and New York pop up galleries
• Collaboration with The African Union Chapter on gender performance
• Group Exhibition at The Slave Lodge Gallery, Cape Town