The longer I chat with Karabo Poppy Moletsane at The Whippet in Linden — the Johannesburg institution that helped spark the explosion of quirky restaurants in the neighbourhood — the more I begin to imagine her as the protagonist in a cross between a Japanese anime and a Pixar production.
It’s as if she is a projection of the bright, colourful world she creates in multiple mediums. She practically vibrates like a sunbeam with a very clear-minded point of view. I tell her this and she rolls with the idea. I can see it now: girl draws world — and what a glorious world it is.
Before she became one of South Africa’s most recognisable contemporary illustrators and world-builders, Poppy grew up in Vereeniging. She laughs as she explains that it is not a town exactly synonymous with a booming creative industry.
She attended Potchefstroom Girls’ High as a boarder. “I had a horrible time,” she says. “I was bullied quite a lot.”
But she doesn’t frame it as purely negative. Boarding school gave her long stretches of solitude, and she filled them by teaching herself to play guitar and exploring creativity in whatever ways she could. “That’s where I learnt problem-solving,” she says. “You had a lot of time to think.”
Art was welcome, but only as a hobby. Then a substitute art teacher intervened. When the teacher asked what she planned to study and heard ‘medicine’, her response was blunt: ‘What a waste.’
For most of her teenage years, however, creativity existed on the margins. Academically gifted, she was firmly on track to study medicine. Her parents, trained teachers, encouraged stability. Art was welcome, but only as a hobby. Then a substitute art teacher intervened. When the teacher asked what she planned to study and heard “medicine”, her response was blunt: “What a waste.”
The teacher wanted to see what Poppy might do with what was clearly an original talent. Poppy was startled. Becoming a doctor, she explained, would allow her to support her family and provide financial security. But the teacher insisted she had a unique creative voice.
Poppy’s response was revealing. She didn’t believe someone from her background could realistically succeed as an artist. “I said maybe that works for people who look like you,” she recalls — meaning white. “But not for someone who looks like me.”
The teacher didn’t argue. Instead, she suggested a detour: stopping at the open day at the Open Window Institute on the way to the University of Pretoria campus for the medical school walk-through.
The plan worked perfectly. In the studios that day, Poppy suddenly saw the creative industry as something real rather than distant. “I completely forgot about medicine,” she laughs. “I was just enthralled.”
Her father noticed immediately. “You love it here,” he told her.
Within hours she had decided to change course. Over lunch that same day she told her parents she wanted to become an artist. “They weren’t thrilled,” she says. “But they knew me well enough to realise my mind was made up.”
After graduating, Poppy made another bold decision. Instead of joining a large advertising agency, she chose to freelance and develop her own visual language rooted in African aesthetics.
Her first assignment was modest: designing artwork for her church. Her second client was something else entirely. “I got an e-mail from Apple.”
The tech giant invited her to contribute artwork to its Product Red initiative supporting HIV/Aids programmes in Africa. “It was my second client ever,” she says. “And suddenly my art was contributing to something much bigger — which was always my dream.”
All the things people say are strange about you — those will become your greatest strengths
— Karabo Poppy Moletsane
For several years work arrived sporadically. At one point she moved back home. Poppy doubled down. She kept drawing. Gradually opportunities began to arrive. Editorial commissions followed, including work for The Wall Street Journal, and clients began associating her style with authentic African storytelling.
Then came the message that changed everything. A WhatsApp arrived from a creative director at Nike. The brand wanted her to reinterpret the iconic Nike Air Force 1 sneaker. She initially thought it was a joke.
“I panicked,” she says. “How do you tell your whole story on a pair of shoes?”
Her solution was to design three versions representing South Africa’s past, present and future. Nike loved them all, put them into production and — voilà — the sneakers sold out within two hours.
Soon they were appearing in arenas and on red carpets. Basketball legend LeBron James wore them repeatedly. Rapper Offset bought several pairs and French football star Kylian Mbappé wore them publicly. “That was the moment I finally believed in myself the way other people seemed to.”
Her work has since taken her around the world. She spent time living in New York, immersing herself in the creative culture, and travelled widely for murals, exhibitions and collaborations. But when Covid struck she returned rapidly to Johannesburg.
“I remembered why I’m supposed to be here,” she says.
Among her most personal projects is the just published children’s book Hugged by the Night, illustrated for African American poet Harold Green III. The imagery was inspired by memories of her parents, especially the bedtime stories her father told. They taught her to see darkness not as something frightening but as a space for expansive creative discovery.
I ask what she would tell the teenage girl she once was — the boarder quietly learning to play guitar in Potchefstroom. She answers without hesitation: “All the things people say are strange about you — those will become your greatest strengths.
“And bravery,” she adds. “I’ve learned the universe rewards bravery. When you do something even though you’re scared, something good usually follows.”
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