Gonçalo Mabunda

In July 2017, his pieces were shown in the European Parliament in an exhibition organized by the European Centre for Electoral Support at the occasion of the launch of a handbook produced in the context of a project funded by the European Union on "Preventing Electoral Conflicts and Violence in the countries of the Southern African Development Communities" that includes Mozambique. The launching seminar in the European Parliament was chaired by the Member of the European Parliament, Judith Sargentini, former Chief Observer to the EU election observation mission in Mozambique and Tanzania and co-chaired by Alojz Peterle, Member of the European Parliament, former Chief Observer to the EU election observation mission in Kenya.

In 2014, Mabunda was one of 20 African artists to figure in French art collector André Magning publication African Stories. In 2015, Mabunda's works were the main subject of CNN show Inside Africa, a TV series highlighting different economic, social and cultural personalities in Africa.

Mabunda started his work in the context of a project implemented in 1995, by the Christian Council of Mozambique (CCM) that has been scouring the country and collecting weapons from individuals and communities after a civil war that lasted almost twenty years. In this project some weapons are destroyed while others are deactivated and given to men and women like Mabunda, to sculpt into art. Some 800,000 weapons have been collected since the CCM launched this project, called Transforming Guns into Hopes.

Gonçalo Mabunda (born 1 January 1975 in Maputo, Mozambique) is a Mozambican artist and anti-war activist. Mabunda has exhibited important museums such as the Center Pompidou in Paris, the Venice Biennale, the Museum of Art and Design in New York, Gangwon International Biennale in South Korea, the Museum Kunst Palast in Düsseldorf, the Hayward Gallery in London, the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, the Johannesburg Art Gallery, the Tropen Museum in Amsterdam, Norway Army Museum, Netherlands Army Museum, Sweden Army Museum, and many more.