Kuwona Hutsi 2017 Matchsticks outlining R.G. Mugabe’s signature and dirty US dollars from Zimbabwe 33 x 31 cm

‘Kuwona hutsi’ means seeing smoke in Shona in Zimbabwe. It is one of the metaphors that the Shona speakers created to communicate various messages concerning the socio-economic and political crisis that has been occurring in their country since the year 2000. ‘Seeing smoke i.e. having smoke in the eyes’ and by extension ‘being caught in a burning building’, all have the connotations of one being on an unsustainable, difficult, hopeless and confusing situation.

The Zimbabwe crisis as captured in Shona metaphor. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233222046_The_Zimbabwe_crisis_as_captured_in_Shona_metaphor