Michael Nkolo Maapola was born in 1949 in Hammanskraal, a township north of Pretoria, Transvaal (now Gauteng Province). He showed an interest in art as a child, and by the age of 17 he was working as an artist, predominately in watercolour. In 1970, he brought some of his paintings to the South African Association of Arts and attracted the attention of the artist Helge Jensen who invited Maapola to enrol at the Art Design School in Pretoria.

John “Shoes” Moshoeu was born on 18 December 1965 in Diepkloof, Soweto, Transvaal (now Gauteng Province). Shoes or the ‘dribbling wizard’ as he was popularly known for his skills in the field of play, began his soccer career at Giant Blackpool, playing alongside other soccer stars like Fanie Madida, Geelbooi Masango and Jury Bantwana. In 1991 he helped Blackpool reach the JPS Cup Final where his team lost to Dynamos. He then moved from Blackpool and joined Kaizer Chiefs in the early 1990s.

Durant Basi Sihlali was born on 5 March 1935 in an industrial area, Germiston, Transvaal, now known as Gauteng Province. Due to harsh living conditions, his parents sent him to live with his paternal grandparents in a rural village called Cala in the Eastern Cape. The wall murals Xhosa women painted captivated Sihlali, who tried to imitate the designs but was chastised for engaging in what was considered a women’s job.

Born in 1975 in Cape Town, Nicholas Hlobo grew up in a Xhosa family and attended university at the former Technikon Witwatersrand. Though originally planning to study art in order to work in the film industry, Hlobo decided to pursue a career as a visual artist as another way of contributing to South African culture.

Welcome Mandla Koboka was born in Johannesburg in 1941. At age twenty he studied art under Cecil Skotnes and Ephraim Ngatane at the Polly Street Art Centre. He worked in charcoal, inks, watercolours and oils, becoming most recognised for his paintings.

David Hlongwane was born on 1 January 1963 in the Zwelethemba township of Worcester. He studied at Vuyisile High School, without completing Matric. Looking at books and magazines inspired his first drawings, which he cultivated without formal instruction.