about

moya/abyssal is a threshold practice unfolding ancestral knowledge and creative inquiry through the ndumba and contemporary creative forms.

It encompasses the ndumba of Gogo Mantwa as well as the curatorial and artistic practice of Mmabatho Thobejane. It is an anti-disciplinary offering that centers the ancestral and ancestral healing through African Traditional Medicine and creative expression. We employ modalities such as divination and herbal medicine, alongside creative practices such as writing and craft.

There are ways the ancestral and its practices are not concentrated in the ndumba. They guide and remain active in other aspects of creative life and life at large, sometimes centrally and sometimes not.

In the past we have spent an agonizing amount of time trying to understand where Gogo Mantwa begins and Mmabatho ends. Parts of moya/abyssal are clearly demarcated in this regard, while others remain willfully opaque.

moya/abyssal is a diasporic practice. Mmabatho was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa and Nkgono Mantwa was initiated in Bloemfontein, South Africa. We are currently working from and based in Stockholm, Sweden.

Our story

In 2023, we underwent initiation into the ubungoma, boporofeta and mosotho traditions of healing, traditions rooted in Bantu Indigenous knowledges. This rite of passage is initiated by an ancestral calling, which became clear to us through dreams, sacred encounters and consultation with initiated elders.

We first felt our calling in 2015 and eventually heeded it in 2023. Through this initiation, and guided by our gobela – elder and mentor – we learned mediumship, divination, folk herbal medicine and traditional forms of healing including cleansings and space fortifications.

Our work is propelled by the ancestral and by being in deep and ongoing relationship with mystery itself. It is centered on botho, which underscores relationality and interdependence, and the concept and practice of ‘hokhapana’ or ‘accompaniment’.

‘Hokhapana’ or accompaniment

We understand accompaniment as an enduring technology that cultivates and sustains resilience and relational skills and capacities. We believe accompaniment is a practice of interdependence.

Through accompaniment, we offer our knowledge and a ‘being with’, which includes walking alongside and holding space as one journeys towards cultivating courage and strength of spirit and heart.

We offer accompaniment both in our ndumba and our creative practice.

In our ndumba, we offer accompaniment through consultations and group offerings such as altar sessions, as well as through offering spiritual companionship as you explore and journey through your spirituality and your relationship with your guides and ancestors.

In our creative practice, our most recent forms of accompaniment have been through taking on roles such as ‘Artistic Facilitation and Caretaking’ and ‘Outside Eye’ in the artistic and creative processes of others.

In these roles we offer accompaniment through mirroring, giving structure and voice to the social reproductive aspects of working in relation, and surfacing clarity within creative processes that involve many collaborators.

We offer accompaniment through and towards ancestral connection, spiritual and emotional well being, and a deepened sense of belonging and relationality and in service of decolonial and liberatory ethics.

Book a connection call to learn more.