Poynton was born in 1970 in Durban and lives in Cape Town.

In 2021, a survey of the last decade of her work, Beyond Belief, took place at the Drents Museum in Assen, the Netherlands. This was followed by her first solo show in Germany, at Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin, in 2022. A previous survey of 25 years of painting, titled Model for a World, showed at the New Church Museum, Cape Town, in 2014. Poynton’s first US solo exhibitions took place at the Savannah College of Art and Design’s galleries in Savannah and Atlanta in 2009. Institutional shows have also taken place at the KZNSA Gallery in Durban (2010) and the Institute of Contemporary Art Indian Ocean in Port Louis, Mauritius (2018). She has held 13 solo exhibitions at Stevenson in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Amsterdam (2004–2023).

Notable group exhibitions include If You Look Hard Enough, You Can See Our Future, African American Museum, Dallas, USA (2023); Unlimited: Self-portraits from the collection, Drents Museum, the Netherlands (2022); I have made a place, Norval Foundation, Cape Town, South Africa (2021); Tamawuj, the 13th Sharjah Biennial, UAE (2017); Home Truths: Domestic Interiors from South African Collections, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town (2016); I Love You Sugar Kane, Institute of Contemporary Art Indian Ocean, Mauritius (2016); Der Feine Riss: Zeitgenössische Malerei auf dem Historischen Feld, Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin, Germany (2016); Exact Imagination: 300 Years of Botanically Inspired Art in South Africa, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa (2014); Experience 3: Truth, El Segundo Museum of Art, El Segundo, California, USA (2013); Eros and Thanatos, SOR Rusche Collection, Oelde/Berlin, Germany (2012); Von Liebeslust und Lebenslast – der inszenierte Alltag, Corvey Castle, Germany (2009); What lies beneath, Galerie Mikael Andersen, Copenhagen, Denmark (2006); New Painting, KZNSA Gallery, Durban, and Unisa Art Gallery, Pretoria, South Africa; and Show Me Home, Johannesburg Art Gallery, South Africa (2003).

Three monographs have been published on her paintings: Everything Matters (SCAD/Stevenson, 2009), Pictures (Stevenson, 2013) and Beyond Belief (W Books/Drents Museum, 2021).

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