Artist Lovell Friedman dies in Cape Town — Daily Maverick
Lovell Friedman, a ceramic sculptor, mosaic artist, activist and humanitarian, died unexpectedly in Cape Town, South Africa, on October 11, 2026, at the age of 63. Daily Maverick reports. Friedman was born in Cape Town on February 17, 1963, and grew up in the Oranjezicht area, where she lived in a house that had belonged to her family for four generations.
Mosaics for the city and communities
Friedman trained as a sculptor at the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town and completed a master's degree in ceramic sculpture with distinction. She taught at Cape Technikon and the Community Arts Project, and also trained mosaic artists, many of whom later launched their own creative projects.
Her works include the 150-centimetre mosaic sculpture Mother Courage for the playground at Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital in Mowbray, a ceramic panel for the hospital's Adolescent and Youth Health Research Unit, and a mosaic near the teaching centre of the University of Cape Town's Faculty of Health Sciences. In 2012, the South African Post Office issued a stamp featuring her mosaic design to mark the centenary of the university's medical school. The work was dedicated to the struggle for life and its affirmation for a person living with HIV.
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Memory in public space
Together with artist Liora Lewis, Friedman created We Are Still Here in the Longmarket pedestrian area near the Cape Town Central Library. It commemorates approximately 7,000 children who were declared destitute in the Cape Government Gazette between 1841 and 1921. If no one claimed or supported them after the notices were published, the children could be placed in indentured employment.
For the Mill Street station of the city's bus rapid transit system, Friedman and mosaic artists trained through the Community Mosaic Project created urban furniture in the form of a ceramic mosaic river. The work refers to Camissa, a network of springs and streams that once flowed from Table Mountain to the sea and now runs through channels beneath the city.
Friedman also collaborated with BRAVE Rock Girl, an organization that creates safe spaces for girls and women. In 2025, she and young participants in the Daring Disa project created a bench near the lower station of the Table Mountain cableway. One of her later works was a mosaic for Tahara House at the Jewish cemetery in Pinelands, unveiled in May 2024.
