Sethembiso Zulu is looking beyond the image to explore a living record of faith, memory, and identity within the Corinthian Church of South Africa. Inside the churches of the Corinthian Church of South Africa, Zulu will be looking at the details that often go unseen: the rituals, regalia, sacred spaces, and stories that give meaning to a community’s faith.

The International Institute of the Arts (IIA) at the University of the Free State (UFS) is welcoming Zulu for a residency supported by the Oppenheimer Memorial Trust. During the residency, he will develop The Corinthian Church of South Africa: A Visual and Spiritual Enquiry, a practice-based research and visual storytelling project examining the rituals, theology, and spiritual hybridity of the Corinthian Church of South Africa.

Looking at the church from within

Zulu approaches the project from an insider perspective, combining photography, film, and installation to document and interpret lived spiritual experiences within the church and its communities.

His fieldwork will take him into Corinthian Church congregations, particularly in Umlazi, KwaZulu-Natal, as well as other communities. There he will document rituals, regalia, and sacred spaces through photography and film, while recording testimonies, songs, and church histories through archival and oral research.

The project builds on Zulu’s established body of work, including Ikhaya Lika Moya, Ngithunywe Yisithunywa, and Ukwambulelwa. His practice brings documentary and auto-ethnographic approaches together with image-making as a way of remembering, questioning, and reclaiming spiritual and cultural knowledge.

From fieldwork to a wider visual archive

The residency will result in a body of work that brings together visual documentation and community knowledge. Zulu envisions a substantial photographic publication and documentary film, alongside exhibitions and installations, community dialogues, and artist talks.

The project also creates an opportunity to consider how religious histories and lived spiritual practices are preserved when much of that knowledge is carried through people, oral traditions, ritual, and memory.

By working directly with congregations and recording their testimonies and histories, Zulu is building an archive from lived experience. The work seeks to create dialogue between sacred and artistic spaces while contributing to the preservation and diversification of South Africa’s visual and cultural heritage.

A practice shaped by visual journalism

Zulu brings extensive experience in photography, filmmaking, and journalism to the residency. He has worked as a multimedia facilitator, moderator, and assessor at Market Photo Workshop, as a senior video journalist at Eyewitness News, and as a multimedia producer and photojournalist at eNCA.

His work has been exhibited in South Africa and internationally, including at the KZN Art Fair, Wits Origins Centre Museum, the Vrystaat Arts Festival, and in Rome.

His recognition includes the Ekurhuleni Prize at the 2021 Thami Mnyele Awards, a Merit Award in Photojournalism at the SAB Environment Journalism Awards, and a Special Mention in the Vodacom Journalist of the Year Awards. His work has also appeared in Camera Austria, Mail & Guardian, City Press, and New Frame.

Creating space for practice-based research

Welcoming Sethembiso Zulu to the university, Prof Vasu Reddy, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research, Innovation and Postgraduate Studies, said the residency reflects the value of creative practice in advancing knowledge and shaping more inclusive futures. “An artist in residence brings a different kind of intelligence into the university. One that asks not only what we know, but what kind of society we wish to become. Through photography and film, Sethembiso demonstrates how visual storytelling can preserve heritage, spark dialogue, and inspire new ways of knowing. Practice-based research challenges us to rethink the boundaries of knowledge and recognise creativity as a vital catalyst for societal transformation.”

The residency is supported by the Oppenheimer Memorial Trust and provides Zulu with time and space to deepen his practice-based research while engaging directly with the communities whose histories inform the project.

For the IIA, the residency brings artistic production, cultural heritage, and community engagement into the same research space. It also extends the institute’s role in creating opportunities for artistic enquiry that connect contemporary practice with questions of identity, spirituality, memory, and African visual heritage.

The IIA looks forward to supporting the development of the project and sharing the resulting work with UFS audiences and beyond.