Zimbabwean-born Tandazani Dhlakama is the Curator of Global Africa at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), Toronto. Previously, she was curator at the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art (Zeitz MOCAA) in Cape Town, where she spearheaded the launch and development of the Zeitz MOCAA & University of the Western Cape (UWC) Museum Fellowship Programme in 2021. At Zeitz MOCAA she curated Seekers, Seers, Soothsayers (2023), co-curated the travelling exhibition When We See Us: A Century of Black Figuration in Painting (2022), co- curated Shooting Down Babylon: A Tracey Rose Retrospective (2022), and curated Five Bhobh: Painting at the End of an Era (2018) amongst others. Her writing and editorial contribution have led to formulation of the publications that accompanied these exhibitions.
Tandazani’s work with the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare (2011-2017), Tsoko Gallery in Harare, El Espacio 23 in Miami, and the 13th Recontres de Bamako- African Biennale of Photography in Bamako contributed to her co-curating Maa ka Maaya ka ca a yere kono—On Multiplicity, Difference, Becoming and Heritage (2022), curating Witness: Afro Perspectives from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection (2020), Beyond the Body (2016); ZimbabweIN Design (2014 and 2017) and Dis(colour)ed Margins (2017) among others. Tandazani’s writing appears in the artist monographs of Akinbode Akinbiyi, Sungi Mlengeya, Georgina Maxim, and Wallen Mapondera, in publications such as Audacious Art Practices: Situating the Contemporary Arts of Africa, Aware Women Artists, Plasticity of the Planet: On Environmental Challenge for Art and Its Institutions and on MOMA’s Post: Notes on Art In A Global Context, TSA Collector’s Series: Artists & Cities, Africanah: Arena for Contemporary African, African American and Caribbean Art, ArtLife Magazine and others.
Tandazani is a Beit Scholar and holds an MA in Art Gallery and Museum Studies from the University of Leeds, UK (2015) and a BA in Fine Art and Political Science from St. Lawrence University, USA (2011). She serves as a member of the NESR Foundation Artistic Committee in Luanda, as well as the ARAK Foundation Advisory Committee in Doha.
