Nov/Dec Cover Star: Khanyi Mbau - Immaterial Girl

Cover Interview: Khensani Mohlatlole

Photographer: Philly Mohlala

Retouching: Banele J

Make-Up: BK

Hair: Thato Mlangeni

Headsets: Beats by Dre x Ambush Design

Wardrobe: The Fashion Agent, Ezokhetho, Native Nylon

Khanyi Mbau is an alien. But not for the reasons you might think. A lot--a lot--has been said about her. In fact, not since Brenda or Lebo do I think you can find a more ubiquitous name than Khany Mbau. It’s difficult to even imagine a tabloid that hasn’t relied on her name at least once for sales and clicks or even any South African that doesn’t have some sort of opinion about her--and it’s often rather damning. She’s a cautionary tale, she’s fake, she’s a material girl. The truth is so much simpler and simultaneously more complicated than that: Khanyi Mbau is a creator.

 I’m remiss to simply call her a pop icon--which she definitely is. If the construction of a pop icon is longevity, ubiquity and distinction then Khanyi certifiably meets that on every level. She’s been in the industry for almost two decades, still as relevant to millennials and Gen Z as she is to our parents. Her name is everywhere - whether she’s on her reality show, partying with powerful men or birthing it-girls and boys. There’s no one else like her, no one else who could have caused the same media frenzy on the set of their first role like Khanyi did with Muvhango. There is no one alive, locally, who you could accurately compare her to either.

No, she’s alien and a creator for much more than that. I asked her how she’s managed to stay so relevant for so long in an industry known for going through people like tissue to which she says, “The funny thing is I’ve always been in and out [of the industry]. People don’t realise that because people have emulated me so much that people think I’m in their faces. You actually see me through other people. I’ve multiplied myself so much that even when I’m not being seen you feel like you’re seeing me.”

 For years, Khanyi was associated with the superficiality and materialism of young women who not only demanded respect but expected their romantic partners to compensate them monetarily. Today, “gold digger” and “sugar baby” aren’t so much pejoratives as they are terms we understand are only used against women, especially Black women, who know their worth. It’s now par for the course for young women to expect that their partners meet them where they are, that these partners only make their lives easier and that they never debase themselves in the name of romance and sacrifice. How much of this would’ve been possible without the villainisation of Khanyi in the media? It’s very easy to draw a link between the girls growing up who saw this woman utilise her likeability, charm and beauty into a financial advantage for herself and in many of the themes we see in hypergamy, feminism and influencer culture today.

She’s had such an impactful hand in creating a culture of liberated women who now control their images. And creating an image, and creating others in her image, is what makes Khanyi a creator before she is an actress or a socialite. There are many stereotypes and insults hurled against women who alter their bodies, especially when it comes to skin bleaching and plastic surgery, that often place the burden of unattainable beauty ideals as the fault of womanly insecurity instead of societal error. Yet, when speaking and listening to Khanyi, you realise that for her there’s an evolutionary aspect to it more than anything.

 As it stands, Khanyi is very open about lightening her skin. She freely shares information about the plastic surgeon she visits, who has altered her nose and breasts. She never regards any of this as stemming from a place of insecurity or shame. “I’ve always been connected to my inner child. I think every human being, from the age of five, it’s either that they wanna look like a princess, or a prince, or a superhero, even the image of their parent and as you grow up society starts changing that. They make you think that you can’t be perfect, that it isn’t about you, that you need to confrom to [a certain] image.” For Khanyi, body modification came about her refusing to let go of those ideals she’s always held, that she could mold her reality to the vision she held in her mind. The world doesn’t get to tell Khanyi Mbau who she is, or what she should look like: only she does.

Being woman and being Black is so regulated by the outside world. Afterall, race and gender are simply just constructs that the world forces us to live by. I think it’s Khanyi’s refusal to give in to these constructs and to live by them as biblical text that makes her so alien for most of us.

 People fear the alien, the unknown, and this fear ignites our fight or flight reflexes - which we can see in the media’s relationship with Khanyi. She represents these radical, rebellious ideas and we act out aggressively deciding to label her as insecure, immoral and just not like the rest of us. But, in a way, she’s more like the rest of us than anything.

 Khanyi’s spent a lot of time observing other people. Even as a child, she would take the time at the parties her parents took her to examine the adults. Now, she takes her daughter out and encourages her to watch people, to really look at them. “What do you think they’re all going through?”

It’s interesting that she tells me this, not only because I believe it to be true but because Khanyi Mbau is never thinking about the future. She has no grand five year plan, specific aspirations for her daughter or even an idea of where she will be living six months from now. Right now, she spends her days in the garden, playing with her dogs or watching The Crown.

“It made me hate Prince Charles again,” she says, “but I have to commend him because he really loved Camilla… so many of us marry people because ‘my parents like him’ or ‘he’s really good with my kid’ meanwhile the actual love of your life is [sidelined].”

 I ask her about her love life, which has been such a topic of interest for so long, and isn’t really a factor for her anymore. Who is Khanyi Mbau if we don’t see her attached to a wealthy man? What about the designer clothes, fast cars and skyrise penthouses?  Who will she be without the rest of us constantly watching and judging her?  “I’m no longer afraid of being alone because I’ve realised that I will never be alone.”

 Khanyi Mbau is on a different plane to the rest of us; not too concerned with the immediate concerns of fame and success. That’s probably what will keep her so famous and so successful - we all just really want to know her secret. She’s too busy pondering about the universe, she’s staying present in the moment, grounding herself to the Earth. It’s powerful that the woman whose meteoric rise to fame was so synonymous with designer clothes, fast cars and luxury penthouses has always known more than anyone that we’re living in a material world but she’s an immaterial girl.

 Maybe now we’ll be ready for her.