Born in 1986 in Uitvlag, a rural village based in Mpumalanga (“the place where the sun rises”). Michael Selekane is a multi-disciplinarian artist who practices from his studio in Midrand.
With a rocky early childhood where he was abandoned by his father and the absence of his mother who had to go away to find employment opportunities in Pretoria, Michael was left to be raised by his grandmother. Moving to Mabopane, a township in Pretoria in 1991, and started his educational journey there. In grade six, Selekane was chosen as one of the top ten students in an art competition and from there, his love and practice for visual arts started. Michael was later introduced by his contemporary Thabo Pitso to the Tshwaraganang Art School in Mabopane where he developed and cultivated his skills in art and started experimenting with oil paint as a medium.
Determined to further his passion for art, Michael enrolled at the Tshwane University of Technology where he obtained his National Diploma in Fine and Applied Arts in 2012 and B- Tech in Fine and Applied Arts in 2014. Since then Michael has had the pleasure of participating in numerous prestigious exhibitions nationally and internationally including the National Arts Festival (Grahamstown) in 2009 and 2010, a solo show at the Pretoria Art Museum in 2015, Constitutional Hill as well as Lizamore and Associates. Michael has also participated in significant art fairs such as the FNB Joburg Art Fair and the Turbine Art Fair and was voted as the best visual artist of 2018.
