The Museum of Modern Art
14.09 - 17.01.2026

The Museum of Modern Art presents ‘New Photography 2025: Lines of Belonging’, the 40th anniversary edition of MoMA’s celebrated New Photography series. Presenting their work at MoMA for the first time, the exhibition includes four Johannesburg artists: Gabrielle Goliath, Lebohang Kganye, Sabelo Mlangeni, and Lindokuhle Sobekwa.

The show brings together a group of 13 international artists and collectives, from four different cities around the world, who are expanding the horizons of the photographic field in the 21st century. Each at various stages in their careers, these artists are presenting distinct bodies of work. Their creative contributions interweave personal narratives with structural, environmental, and colonial histories to consider forms of belonging that shape communities.

Since it was launched in 1985, New Photography has introduced MoMA audiences to the innovative practices of more than 150 international artists. The featured practitioners in ‘New Photography 2025′  work in and out of one of four cities that have existed as centers of life, creativity, and communion for longer than the nation states within which they are presently situated: Johannesburg, Kathmandu, New Orleans, and Mexico City.

Lindokuhle Sobekwa. Tell it to the Mountains. 2020. Installation view at A4 Art Foundation, South Africa, December 2020. © 2024 Lindokuhle Sobekwa. Courtesy the artist

Lebohang Kganye. Untouched by the ancient caress of time, 2022. Installation view of Staging Memories, the Grand Prix Images Vevey 2021/2022 winning project, produced by Images Vevey (Switzerland) and premiered at the Biennale Images Vevey 2022. Photo: Emilien Itim

Sabelo Mlangeni, Faith and Sakhi Moruping, Thembisa Township, 2004;14 5/8 × 10 9/16″ (37.1 × 26.8 cm)
Gelatin silver print;Judith and Wm. Brian Little Fund;© 2024 Sabelo Mlangeni

Featured artists

Sandra Blow (b. 1990, lives and works in Mexico City), Gabrielle Goliath (b. 1983, lives and works in Johannesburg), L Kasimu Harris (b. 1978, lives and works in New Orleans), Lebohang Kganye (b. 1990, lives and works in Johannesburg), Tania Franco Klein (b. 1990, lives and works in Mexico City), Sheelasha Rajbhandari (b. 1988, lives and works in Kathmandu), Renee Royale (b. 1990, lives and works in New Orleans and Chicago), Nepal Picture Library (est. 2011, based in Kathmandu), Sabelo Mlangeni (b. 1980, lives and works in Johannesburg), Lindokuhle Sobekwa (b. 1995, lives and works in Johannesburg), Gabrielle Garcia Steib (b. 1994, lives and works in New Orleans), Prasiit Sthapit (b. 1988, lives and works in Kathmandu), Lake Verea (Francisca Rivero-Lake, b. 1973; Carla Verea, b. 1978, live and work in Mexico
City).