Alberto Chissano
Alberto Mabungulane Chissano (25 January 1935 – 19 February 1994) was a Mozambican sculptor best known for his work using indigenous woods, and sculptures in rock, stone and iron. He is considered to be one of Mozambique's most important and influential artists, together with the painter 
Malangatana Ngwenya.

Life and art
Alberto Chissano was born in Manjacaze, Gaza, in the south of Portuguese Mozambique. Like other boys in the countryside, Chissano spent his early life looking after goats. He had limited schooling; his studies were hindered by his expulsion from his mission school for dancing the traditional dance Ngalanga. He was strongly influenced by his maternal grandmother, who taught him rites and traditions such as how to divine through the use of ossicles and snail shells, as well as traditional herbal medicine.

At the age of 12, he felt that Manjacaze was too limited an area for his aspirations, so he left for the capital, Lourenço Marques. In the capital, he found being a domestic worker unsatisfactory.  He left to work in the gold mines of South Africa at the age of 18.

When he returned to Mozambique in 1956, he had to do his mandatory military service in the colonial Portuguese armed forces. He obtained a position as a servant at the art centre Associação Núcleo de Arte in the capital, and later trained in taxidermy at Museu Álvaro de Castro (now Museum of Natural History).  There he was introduced to sculpting by the taxidermist Augusto Cabral. Later he returned to Núcleo de Arte, where he was inspired by the artistic environment and supported by more experienced artists. He began sculpting in his late twenties and had his first exhibition in Lourenço Marques in 1964. In subsequent years, his sculptures appeared in several exhibitions in the United States, Europe, and Africa.

Chissano was a pioneer for a generation of sculptors in the 1970s, a decade that spanned the last years of the colonial period and the beginning of Mozambican independence. He became the most famous and influential sculptor in Mozambique. His sculptures tell a lot about the history of Mozambique, the people, struggle, starvation, and suffering, but also joy and pride.

Chissano turned his family home in Matola into a museum and gallery, Museu Galeria Chissano. The museum exhibits many of Alberto Chissano's own sculptures as well as many paintings by Malangatana and other artists. In addition to being a museum, it is a centre for exhibitions, concerts, and other cultural events.

In 1982, he was awarded the Nachingwea Medal, a medal presented by the government of Mozambique in recognition of '’extraordinary merit'’. (The medal is named after FRELIMO's main camp in Tanzania during the Mozambican War of Independence).

Alberto Chissano died at 59, on 19 February 1994, in Matola.

Selected exhibitions
1964 First solo exhibition, Maputo
1966 Town Hall, Lorenço Marques, 1st Prize
1967 International exhibition in Washington, 2nd Prize in the African art category
1968 Group exhibition, London
1971 Munich, Germany
1971 Town hall of the Machopes, Chibuto, Gaza, Mozambique
1972 Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes (National Society of Fine Arts), Lisbon
1975 Several group exhibitions in Mozambique and Nigeria
1980 Inauguration of Museu Nacional de Arte (the National Art Museum), Maputo
1981 International Symposium of Sculptures, Belgrade, Yugoslavia, 1st and 2nd prizes
1981 Group exhibitions in Berlin (Germany), Sofia (Bulgaria), Moscow (Soviet Union), Luanda (Angola)
1981 Exhibition of marble sculpture at Ar.Co – Centro de Arte e Comunicação Visual (Center for Art and Visual Communication), Lisbon
1983 Group exhibitions in Portugal (Lisbon and Porto) and Zimbabwe (Harare)
1984 Malangatana & Chissano Indian Council for Cultural Relations, New Delhi, India
1985 Palazzo Barberini, Rome and the Teatro Municipal, Reggio Emilia, Italy
1986 Havana Biennial, Cuba, 1st Prize
1987 Solidarity week with Mozambique, Zimbabwe
1987 Malangatana & Chissano, Ankara, Turkey
1991 Le Temps Et Le Sang (The Time and the Blood), Réunion
1992 Represents, among others, Mozambique in EXPO'92 in Seville, Spain
1999 Two artists. Two generations, with Titos Mabota, Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, Norway
2000 Two artists. Two generations, with Titos Mabota, Bergen Museum, Bergen, Norway
2006 The Africa Centre, London

See also
 Culture of Mozambique

References
 "Chissano Escultura", Cooperativa de Actividades Artísticas CRL, Porto, Portugal. 1990
 "Chissano & Titos. Two Artists. Two Generations" (in Norwegian and English), Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, Norway. 1999
 "Chissano, o escultor da luminosidade cromática", Museu Galeria Chissano. 2010

Art galleries featuring Chissano's work
 Museu Galeria Chissano, Rua Escultor Chissano, 307, Bairro Sial, Matola, Maputo Province
 Museu Nacional de Arte (National Art Museum), Maputo
 African Contemporary | Art Gallery

External links
 Description of access to Museu Galeria Chissano, Matola

1935 births
1994 deaths
Mozambican sculptors
Recipients of the Nachingwea Medal
People from Matola
People from Gaza Province