Gifted: MJ Turpin

MJ Turpin is a visual artist, a co-director at Kalashnikovv Gallery, and a director of Studio Grey — a creative-ecologies complex and residency programme in Joburg. He has participated in numerous local and international exhibitions, and his most recent solos include “Take Me Apart” with No End Contemporary (Joburg) in 2019 and AVA Gallery in 2022.

Recent group shows include “Mass”, curated by Louis de Villiers at Kalashnikovv Gallery in 2021, and “A Hook”, at Studio Nxumalo in 2023. His work can be found in numerous private and public collections, including the Ellerman House Collection, Linda Givon Collection, Play Braamfontein Collection, Life Collection, and the Wits Art Museum Collection.

What are your essential grooming products?

All my products are by The Ordinary.

Favourite scent?

Please wait here, by Apartment.

A building everyone should visit before they die?

The Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk, Denmark, and Zeitz Mocaa in Cape Town.

What’s occupying your artistic mind?

“Drawings with Ghosts” — a series of collaborative drawings I’m creating with my grandfather’s life-drawing archive.

What about an artwork draws you in?

Innovation and authenticity.

Favourite places to eat?

Acid Food & Wine Bar (Parktown North, Joburg) and Pron (Linden, Joburg).

Your favourite clothing brands?

Superella and Y-3.

What makes you happiest?

An empty gym.

What are you reading and listening to at the moment?

I’m reading James Baldwin’s Nobody Knows My Name and listening to Bird’s Eye by Ravyn Lenae.

Last travel destination that knocked your socks off?

Milan.

Your favourite room in the house?

My studio.

Your biggest purchases that you a) regret and b) that you would buy all over again?

1. MTN shares; b) art.

The most challenging aspect of your work in the past year?

Growing into the global art fair market.

Your greatest luxury?

Travel.

A colour that is underrated?

Grey.

A visual artist you have your eye on?

Ntsako Nkuna.