Allina Ndebele

Allina Ndebele's wedding tapestry.

Allina Ndebele was born in 1939 at the Ekuhlengeni Mission at Swart Umfolozi near Vryheid. While training as a nurse at Ceza Hospital she met Peeler and Ulla Gowenius.

She worked with them in the Occupational Therapy department, where she learned and then taught simple weaving to patients.

In 1964 Ndebele was given a scholarship to train as a weaving teacher in Sweden. The Gowenius's had meanwhile moved to the Oscarsberg Mission and established the Rorke's Drift Art and Craft Centre. On her return from Sweden, Ndebele went to Rorke's Drift for further training and became a master weaver and teacher. In 1977 she decided to return to her father's kraal and establish her own workshop.

Allina Ndebele's wedding tapestry.

It was at first a small venture with family and friends, carding and dyeing wool. But then Ndebele began directing her thoughts to designing the tapestries. She remembered her childhood and the legendary stories her great-grandmother used to tell, and based her designs on them. In 1985 a major exhibition of her tapestries was held in the Pretoria Art Museum.

Ndebele's tapestries, while perhaps reminiscent of the Rorke's Drift weavings, showed an individuality and complexity which no doubt developed from her working on her own, away from the influence of other weavers and designers.

Except for a few small tapestries which we had in 1980 - and which were bought immediately by London art critic Edward Lucie-Smith during a visit to Durban - Ndebele's tapestries were not available again at the Centre until 1990, when she sent two magnificent works. One measuring 154 centimetres by 254 centimetres, Ibhubesi Elalivilapha, was bought by the Tatham Art Gallery. The other, measuring 160 centimetres by 235 centimetres and titled Umbongo, was snapped up by the Durban Art Gallery.

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