lené Bothma was born in 1981 in Port-Elizabeth, South Africa. She is a wife and mother of two children living and working in Cape Town, South-Africa. She received a BA in Fine Art (with distinction) in 2003 and an MA in Fine Art, in 2007, from the Stellenbosch University, South Africa. After marrying and working as an art teacher for three years, she resumed her studies in England where she obtained a second MA in Fine Art (with distinction) in 2011 from Northumbria University in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, United Kingdom.

She started exhibiting as a student and her work has regularly featured in group exhibitions since 2000. Her work has been shown both locally and internationally. She has had 7 solo exhibitions, 5 of which have been in the last 7 years. 99 Loop Gallery has regularly featured her paintings at the prestigious Investec Cape Town Art Fair. Bothma’s most recent solo exhibition Life, Death and All The Fear In-Between was received with public and media acclaim.

Ilené has been nominated as a finalist in numerous national art competitions, including Sasol New Signatures 2007, Vuleka Art Competition 2012 and Barclays L’Atelier 2016. Her work has been included in numerous private and public collections including the M&C Saatchi Abel Art Collection and the Art Bank of South Africa. A recent article about her art practice titled, “Stitching and unpicking ambivalence toward womanhood and maternity in works by Ilené Bothma” by Irene Bronner, senior lecturer at the University of Johannesburg, has been published in the visual culture journal “Image and Text” in December 2020. This article provides an indepth overview of various aspects of her art practice thus far.