Tag: history

Discwoman South African Tour: Technofeminism, UMFANG + SHYBOI

Championing diversity in the electro music industry, the femme-focused Not Sorry Club awards special dedication to building a more inclusive rave community by bringing UMFANG and SHYBOI, two of Discwoman’s finest artists, to South African shores for events in both Cape Town and Joburg towards the end of September.

Founded by Frankie Decaiza Hutchinson,Emma Burgess-Olson aka UMFANG, and Christine McCharen-Tran, Discwoman was initially conceptualized as a two-day festival in Brooklyn with an all-woman line-up back in 2014. The New York-based collective has since expanded into a booking agency and platform that showcases the wealth of female-identifying DJ talent on the rave and hybrid club music scene. They have gone on to produce and curate events in 15+ cities globally — packing heat with over 250 DJs and producers to-date.

Discwoman co-founder UMFANG holds a monthly residency called Technofeminism at Bossa Nova Civic Club focusing on emerging talent. Her sets serve up a pulse-electrifying cocktail of icy techno and abstract rave through amorphous polyrhythmic productions, playing with people’s expectations of how a techno set can be defined. UMFANG’s is on a mission to evoke something inside of you in her most recent offering, Symbolic Use of Light, which boasts a sound that leans more on the harder side of techno and was released on Ninja Tune’s Technicolour imprint.

Known for causing sonic disruption from a creative position between Caribbean and American culture, multidisciplinary artist SHYBOI uses sound to interrogate ideas of identity, power, and history. She is a former member of the queer artist collective #KUNQ whose ethos is centred on the production of multidimensional work through sound, visual and performance art while expanding the discourse surrounding the subcultures and genres that have become diluted or obscured in the name of hybridity. In addition to this, SHYBOI has three Boiler Room sets under her ever-widening belt.

As the collective’s ethos goes: “Amplify each other”, in consonance with Discwoman’s endeavour to highlight female and non-binary artists through their Technofeminism movement, workshops will be hosted in each city in collaboration with shesaid.so South Africa and will include interactive couch sessions as well as inclusive cognitive enlightenment.

Keep your eyes on Not Sorry Club’s social pages for the local line-up announcement and more details on the event.

23 August 2018
Using allegory as a conceptual and visual device with photographer Nydia Blas

Artist Nydia Blas uses photography, collage, books and video in her exploration of lived experience, history and the limits of social constructs – specifically from her point of view as a Black woman and mother. Her work also touches on unpacking sexuality as well as understandings and expressions of intimacy.

Using allegory as a conceptual and visual device in her photography, Blas webs together signifiers and articulations of value, power and circumstance through the Black feminine lens. She presents counter narratives, destabilizing stereotypes, and her work becomes testimonies of alternative spaces and identities created by the people she photographs. In doing so she delicately maps out the relationship between resilience and resistance.

She is a recipient of the 2018 Light Work Grant, a photography program that supports artists working in Central New York. Her work is also featured in the book MFON: A Journal of Women Photographers of the African Diaspora, a commemorative publication that is committed to representing a collective voice of women photographers of African descent with the inaugural issue featuring 100 women photographers across the African diaspora.

Her series The Girls Who Spun Gold was inspired by a number of factors, the most prominent being a group of women she met while working at a community centre before embarking on her MFA degree. Blas feels that their meeting was a serendipitous moment, as at the time she had just become a single mother of two children, and the women she met were at the age when Blas last remembers feeling a child. The decision to photograph these women came from the desire to maintain a connection, but soon into the process she felt the need to include herself in the series. “The result is a series of images that work to complicate the notion of what it means to be a girl, a teenager, and a mother. I want the subjects to reclaim themselves, for themselves. I want the images to speak to this intricate process that is painful, messy, beautiful, joyful, etc,” Blas expressed in an interview with Strange Fire Collective.

Her latest series, Whatever You Like, sees Blas capture the people she photographs with an honesty that makes the viewer feel connected to each person. The work aims to unfold the ways that young women of colour learn to reclaim themselves for their own gratification, attempting to undo seeing themselves through the eyes of others. The simplicity of the images creates the feeling that these are moments of reflective self engagement that Blas was invited to monumentalize.

Through the above mentioned series one can see how Blas takes on moments of transition, learning and reclaiming, allowing the people she photographs to take ownership of the image through their strong presence.

31 May 2018
Photographer and Journalist Rahima Gambo’s ‘Education is Forbidden’ makes a social commentary on the post-colonial education system in north-eastern Nigeria

Rahima Gambo studied Development at the University of Manchester and thereafter completed a Masters in Gender and Social Policy at the London School of Economics. This was followed with her Masters in Journalism at Columbia Graduate School in 2014. Her interdisciplinary practice looks at Nigerian identity, gender, socio-political issues and history. Her series Education Is Forbidden makes use of photography, illustration, text and film to articulate a troubling narrative that remains without end.

With her photo essay, Education is Forbidden, the photographer and journalist challenges the Boko Haram insurrection, the condition of the post-colonial education system in north-eastern Nigeria as well as the status of women in society. Showcased as a part of the curated projects at ART X Lagos art fair, it has been in development since 2015.

The project has been built on and grown due to support given by the International Women’s Media Foundation, propelled forward by “a curiosity to understand what it means to be a student on the front lines.” Rahima, who is from the region and currently residing in Abuja, travelled to schools and universities in various states to meet activists, pupils and teachers. This acted as an entry point for her documentation of the lasting trauma and infrastructural deterioration, beginning decades before and is currently destabilised by conflict.

To create this body of work Rahima’s approach was to show girls from a stylised, prolific point of view. Employing traditional portraiture techniques, the photographer aimed to focus on points of familiarity and visual signifiers that remind her audience of how carefree school days should be. These signifiers include a girl blowing a bubble with chewing gum and other girls calmly look into her lens. The works take a frontal approach created collaboratively with the girls that she photographed.

Rahima tells these girls’ stories as their youth is poisoned by these events of trauma. It is important to note that she does not intend to label them by these circumstances or define them as victims. “The project is not based on trauma because you can find that in any condition, no matter how comfortable…” she expresses in an interview with Nataal. Her series has the twofold effect of being both a visual documentation and captured moments of collective memory. Her work is then a visual narrative speaking of the cruelties of conflict and its effect on the educational framework of the region.

29 May 2018
The use of fabric in art for preservation, reflection and identity

Throughout the history of art, artists have appreciated the versatility that fabric possesses. Viewed as clothing, skin and a source of identity, it can be manipulated and molded into an object (or subject) with conceptual depth. It allows for the creation of soft sculptures, or be used as aids in performance, but does not deny artists the ability to project a sense of hardness, scale or visual weight. Textiles can also be used as a presentation of and reflection on colonialism and global trade, as with the work of UK-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare with his investigations of political and social histories. Fabric also offers a way to think about personal histories, as with the case of Accra-based artist Serge Attukwei Clottey‘s work My Mother’s Wardrobe.

‘My Mother’s Wardrobe’ by Serge Attukwei Clottey

Clottey’s work generally examines the power of everyday objects. However, the above mentioned work is potent in the way that it gives an avenue for thinking about the use and signification that fabric offers artists and viewers. Through this work he explored the connection that fabric can create between mothers and their children. In this work he used performance as a way to interrogate gender roles along with notions of family, ancestry and spirituality. This was a personal work inspired by the death of his mother, and the performance unpacked the concept of materiality with the intention of honouring women as the collectors and custodians of cloth that serve as signifiers of history and memory. Clottey presents a vulnerability in the way that he brings across his own experiences, while inviting viewers to think about their own personal connections to his subject matter.

While is broader practice involves photography, installation, sculpture and performance, this work highlights the significance of fabric when thinking about personal and collective cultures, histories and intimacies.

Artwork by Turiya Magadlela

Johannesburg-based artists Turiya Magadlela uses fabric as her primary medium, cutting, stitching and stretching it over wooden frames. Her use of commonly found fabrics, such as pantyhose and uniforms brings the past life of the fabric into the exhibition space, where it’s very presence creates animated associations in the minds of viewers. Her use of familiar fabrics allows her work to oscillate between abstract art and a collection of memories interwoven with articulations of experiences of womanhood, motherhood and narratives from Black South African history.

Looking at the work of Clottey and Magadlela the significance of fabric as a container of history and memories becomes clear. Its physical and conceptual malleability highlights its ability to be a tool for preservation, reflection and identity.

12 April 2018
Artist Florine Demosthene on the Black Heroine

“Would you be willing to suspend all your preconceived notions of what a heroine is supposed to be?”

This question was directed at Nigerian writer Ayodeji Rotinwa by artist Florine Demosthene. The Haitian-American artist is exhibiting her new show titled “The Stories I Tell Myself” at Gallery 1957 in Accra. This exhibition is comprised of work created during her four month residency with the gallery.

Demosthene’s painted and collaged black heroine projects a strong yet calming presence, possessing contemplative poses with a divine gaze. She appears to be floating, while still enjoying a full form.

Florine Demosthene, ‘Untitled Wound #1’, 2018

Demosthene points to the fact the black heroine is nothing new. Heroines with mythological characteristics, goddesses, all-women armies and warriors have occupied real life and the imaginaries of cultures throughout past and present history. Demosthene’s work simply channels the spirit and energy of women past, present and future who have the ability to protect, bring life and divine the future. Her work speaks to the necessity of presenting narratives of black heroines as valuable, valid and true in and of themselves, detached from the visual and discursive constructions that relate them to men and whiteness.

This gesture present in the execution of her concept is powerful in that it encourages viewers to question who they are when prejudices and outside projections absorbed by their skin and methods of identity construction are removed. Demosthene’s heroine suggests that perfection is not heroic, and that the necessity of removal and breaking down for a more self appreciating and celebratory being is a kind of power too.

Florine Demosthene, ‘Untitled Wound #2’, 2018

11 April 2018
Artist and filmmaker Kitso Lynn Lelliott on disrupting knowledge hierarchies

Michel-Rolph Trouillot in his book Silencing the Past: The Power and the Production of History interrogates ideas about the history and pastness, demonstrating how positions of power silence certain voices from History. He points to how oppressive, destructive and inhuman interpretations of people of colour led to colonial powers not being able to imagine histories or a History that could be animated, directed and authored by people of colour.

The work of Kitso Lynn Lelliott also unpacks the philosophical and ontological constructions of race that emerged during European Imperialism, which resulted in multilayered tools and attitudes for ‘Othering’. One of the most important tool was that of hegemonic colonial languages; language as the foundation of these constructions, as well as what allows for these constructions to continue to have life. In this sense, Lelliott, similar to what Trouillot states, looks at pastness as a position as much as a temporal concept (Trouillot 1995: 15).

Her solo presentation of a multimedia body of work, titled I was her and she was me and those we might become, was born out her PhD research related to the perpetuation of the idea of “racially marked beings” and how this led to the erasure of knowledges held in diverse languages. This becomes more apparent when one thinks of language as more than sounds for communication. Language carries a particular imaginary of the world, a way to interpret the world and a way to describe the world.

As a way to speak back to these dominant narratives, Lelliott uses the “language of the ghostly” to gesture towards the presence and absence of omitted knowledges and histories. This is incredibly powerful as it is a reminder of the conscious and active act of silencing, while simultaneously pointing out that the imaginaries, mythologies, memories and multitude of ancestral histories can never be silenced.

About her installation Lelliott stated that, “It is a gesture to reclaim an agency to articulate the narratives that make us, through dialogue that is always in flux, so they might produce a shape we see fit for ourselves.” In this statement we can directly see interest in voicing from spaces beyond epistemic power, as well as how epistemic articulation that pushes against hegemonic forms of knowledge identification and construction offers avenues to break down these hegemonic practices and knowledge hierarchies. This is particularly relevant in a time when we are thinking about decolonial practices and how they can be played out in real life.

“. . . But we may want to keep in mind that deeds and words are not as distinguishable as often we presume. History does not belong only to its narrators, professional or amateur. While some of us debate what history is or was, others take it into their own hands.” (Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Silencing the Past 1995: 153)

26 March 2018
Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action // generative archiving and LGBTIQ activism

Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action (GALA), situated at Wits University, is a centre for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and questioning/queer (LGBTIQ) culture and education in southern Africa. “Our mission is to act as a catalyst for the production, preservation and dissemination of knowledge on the history, culture and contemporary experiences of LGBTIQ people,” states Keval Harie, GALA’s director. The reason for the inception of GALA in1997 stems from their original name, ‘Gay and Lesbian Archives’. The purpose of GALA was to address the erasure of the stories and experiences of LGBTIQ people from official archives and other spaces. Since then the scope of their work has expanded to include a multitude of activities that focus on dialogue around sexuality and gender identity with the purpose of educating the public, building a community among LGBTIQ people, and to inspire action.

Image from ‘Out the Box: A Glimpse into 20 Years of Queer Archiving’

“In 2007 we changed our name to Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action (while retaining the acronym GALA) to better reflect this development. However, the archival programme remains the heart of GALA.”

As a working archive that reclaims a place in the regional history and culture for LGBTIQ people, GALA does not collate information and host events in an attempt to state that LGBTIQ people are homogenous. Instead their direction is towards heterogeneous experiences but within shared structural, institutionalised marginalisation which is filtered into everyday discrimination.

“Today, we are the custodian of a large number of individual and organisational archival collections that document the history, culture and contemporary experiences of LGBTIQ people in Africa. Our archives and accompanying resources are freely available via our website and to visitors to our office.”

Youth forum member Wenzile photographed by Genevieve Louw

“Homosexuality is un-African”. This is one of the many statements that GALA is hoping to wipe away. “We aim to re-insert queer voices into Africa’s history. During our two decades of working we have played a unique role – affirming LGBTIQ communities, shaping public opinion and enhancing perceptions of queer African identities, in South Africa and across the southern African region,” Keval explains. The information they store and preserve have been used to create other ways of sharing knowledge, including plays, and theses. This points to the fact that their archive is generative.

Enforcing self- and collective empowerment, over the past 10 years GALA has created youth programmes, including a weekly Youth Forum and monthly Queer Realness publications. These offer physical and political safe zones of representation and forms of support for young queer-identifying people.

GALA 20 poster designed by Cameron Anzio Jacobs

In addition to this GALA curates an exhibition every two years. By translating their messages into a visual language, they are able to engage with another audience and present another avenue for dialogue through a different medium. “Our latest exhibition (2017), held at the Johannesburg Holocaust & Genocide Centre, was a retrospective exhibition focused on the archive collections, and formed part of our 20th anniversary celebrations. It was called ‘Out the Box: A Glimpse into 20 Years of Queer Archiving‘.”

At the moment GALA is working on an education programme that will be facilitated by various university spaces. GALA will also curate exhibitions titled “Out the Box: 20 years of Queer Archiving” and “Kewpie” this year along with launching their GALA 20 book that commemorates 20 years of GALA’s work since 1997. Keep an eye on their Facebook page for more details.

Photography by Keval Harie

Photography by Keval Harie

7 February 2018
The Wanderer – Stability through Movement

In search of a meaningful way to stay intellectually charged and creatively engaged, Jason Storey said goodbye to his corporate law position in New York and followed his dream of becoming a full-time designer in South Africa. He now explores fashion creatively in its various conceptual forms with the label he started with his sister – Unknown Union.

When the label was launched in 2010, it took root in a retail store on Kloof Street in Cape Town, and it housed a collection of international brands alongside their own small capsule collection. 2014 saw the siblings open a design studio in Salt River. The same year also saw the inception of a larger collection that reflected upon the art, history and culture they encountered on the African continent. And in 2015 their brother Oscar left his job in the US to join the team. In their newest location on Bloem Street in Cape Town’s CBD, Unknown Union blends art, fashion, literature and music as a way to stay a “community of people that dig the arts.”

Their latest offering is a collaboration with photographer Cathrin Schulz titled The Wanderer – Stability through Movement. This body of work is a crisp exhibition of Unknown Union’s garments and Cathrin’s extraordinary command of lighting. An additional layer to this visual treat comes in the form of a short fashion film shot by Anna Schulz. With a behind-the-scenes feel, the film opens with the model getting camera ready accompanied by the soothing tone of James Blake’s voice breaking free as the music starts, bringing one into the Wanderer’s journey. I had an interview with Jason to find out more about the project.

Tell us a bit about The Wanderer – Stability through Movement and how it came into being?

The Wanderer can be seen as a pilot for an upcoming series and a fruitful collaboration between Unknown Union and Cathrin Schulz. A team of creatives sat down and brought in their expertise as a form of creative exchange. The cultural diversity of the creators brought up a colourful mix of ideas, leading to the story of The Wanderer. The result is the art directed and photographed edition by Cathrin Schulz and a complementary film by Anna Schulz.

What was the inspiration behind it?

The source of the collaboration is to merge the creative languages into a synergy. Unknown Union weaves ancestral knowledge into fashion, while Cathrin Schulz infuses spirituality into her visual medium of photography. The red thread is to connect the respective visions and create an effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.

The series found inspiration in conveying the concept of Human Design, a science of differentiation. The Wanderer is a primal aspect found on both of the artists’ work, to convey a deeper message – a message of interpreting experience, emotions and stories – into a stimulating form of expression.

What is the message you wanted to convey with this film?

The medium of film visualizes and highlights the project’s aspect of ‘Stability through Movement’. Its purpose was to portray the creative flow of the shoot, as well as giving access to the different angles of the scenes. The intended message is simple: the beauty of creative collaboration.

What sparked the collaboration with Anna-Marie Schulz?

The collaboration was sparked by Unknown Union’s openness to provide Anna Schulz with a creative platform of expression within ‘The Wanderer – Stability through Movement’. It is rooted in creative exchange.

What can we expect to see from Unknown Union in the future?

We are going to dig further into current themes as well as unveil some new themes at this year’s runway show on February 10, at SAMW (AW18). In March, we’ll open our newest location in Johannesburg – in Maboneng.

With The Wanderer – Stability through Movement as the pilot, Unknown Union’s partnership with Cathrin Schulz promises to bring about sheer viewing pleasure. To watch the film go to their Instagram.

The Team:

Clothing: Unknown Union

Photographer: Cathrin Schulz

Stylist: Kshitij Kankaria

Hair & Make-Up: Richard Wilikson

Model: Cristiano Palmerini

Filmmaker: Anna Schulz

1 February 2018
Robyn Kater: the intersection between history, identity and the city as a living organism

Robyn Kater is a bold, passionate and multifaceted artist who is deeply inspired by the city of Johannesburg and all those who live within it. She views her home city, Johannesburg as the compelling and rich space that has greatly influenced her personal identity as well as artwork. The 23-year-old freelance artist, who recently graduated from WITS University with her Fine Art degree, relates her journey as that of self-discovery, learning and unlearning as well as one of trial and error.

The use of Johannesburg as Robyn’s leading inspiration has motivated her to produce a powerful body of work titled, ‘Toxic Playground’. Robyn describes ‘Toxic Playground’ as a mixed media installation that comprises of photography, video and found objects through which she examines how the Johannesburg mine dumps become palimpsests of personal memory and toxicity. The ‘Toxic Playground’ installation consists of 100kg of sand which was collected over three months from the Riverlea mine dump – this is of significant sentiment to Robyn as she grew up in the community situated right next to the dump.

‘Toxic Playground’ is emblematic of the socio-economic and environmental issues currently facing the residents of the area, and essentially speaks to the community’s concerns. This is because the city’s mine dumps have been normalized to be included in the community’s everyday landscape, yet they are severely toxic. They symbolize the exploitative deep-rooted nature of the city. Robyn’s body of artwork raises important questions that require effective answers such as: “what should be done with remnants of the city’s division post-conflict, post-apartheid state? What influence do memory and remembrance of these places have on transformation of the city’s spatial morphology (formation), identity and flows of everyday urban life?”.

In all aspects of this work Robyn does the job of detecting the intersection between history, heritage, identity, displacement and space. Robyn eloquently expresses how she is “interested in the city as a living organism and how the tangible and intangible fragments meet and overlap to form a lived experience”. An in-depth interpretation of Robyn’s artwork demonstrates that she thinks of Johannesburg in various ways. She sees the city as a complex living organism in which certain spaces act as remnants of personal memory and of an overlapping history. In addition to this, her unique artwork illustrates a vivid relationship that the city of Johannesburg presents between space and identity.

Robyn is open to collaborate with people outside of the art industry such as historians, architects and urban planners. She would also like to have to the opportunity to exhibit her work at more experimental spaces. Having showcased at Wits Art Museum, The Point of Order as well as Nothing Gets Organised and with the hopes of showcasing at Zeitz MOCAA someday, Robyn is truly one fearless trailblazer who is more than ready to get her message across.

26 January 2018
Title in Transgression // an art collective as a support system

“The importance of collectivity solely exists on the support it gives artists of colour in an industry and country engineered to exclude us,” states Malebona Maphutse, a member of the art collective Title in Transgression.

Malebona bonded with the other three members of the collective, Boitumelo Motau, Dineo Diphofa and Simnikiwe Buhlungu, in a History of Art course they found problematic in content and through the skewed socio-political consciousness of the class due to the lack of black students in the course. Individually their work explores themes related to history, archives, visibility and invisibility, forms of knowledge production, forms of ritual healing, rape culture and Black feminisms. Together, they collaboratively explore ideas of collectivity and togetherness through their happenings. An important aspect of their collective process is reviewing each other’s work as a way to “tackle certain perversions of our work”.

As a collective that is not afraid to directly address cultural appropriation, as well as race and gender politics, they have produced zines, tote bags and tshirts with slogans that express their views. “We made shirts with the slogans, ‘Aluta Continua’, ‘Who Polices the Police’ and ‘Teacher Don’t Teach Me Nonsense’ during the 2016 Fees Must Fall protests. We were looking for different ways of engaging with the protests as artists,” Malebona states.

In continuing with the discussion about the themes they address in their work, I asked Title in Transgression about the importance of collective practice and their views on Johannesburg’s art spaces.

What is the importance of collective practice, particularly for you as artists of colour?

(Malebona) We exist as three black females and one black male. The importance of collectivity solely exists in the support it gives artists of colour in an industry and country engineered to exclude us. We find ways to tackle certain perversions of our work by constantly having them in a process of collective review by each member of the group. The four of us do face gendered and racial issues that are part and parcel of the socio-economic and historical status of this country. We find that collectivity grants a space where we can find solutions to financial, racial, and gendered or any other issue through collective think tanks such as collectives.

(Boitumelo) We took inspiration from other art collectives who used aesthetic means to say something they thought is important. Not only are the bags and shirts cool they also carry value in the messages they have.

(Dineo) We created a space for ourselves that in some ways acted as a support system. The world is tough for black women.

(Simnikiwe) As a basis, a support system. Although we must emphasise that Title also exists because of our dynamic as three black womxn (Malebona, Dineo and Myself) and Boitumelo as a male. It’s difficult already as a black artists and it becomes more complex as a black women – we either fall in the box of being invisible or hypervisible. These are the symptoms of the conditions that marginalise us.

As young artists of colour who have recently graduated from Wits, and who have participated in events such as Joburg Fringe and Lephephe hosted by Keleketla! Library, can you please share your views on Johannesburg’s art spaces?

(Malebona) As young individuals/artists Johannesburg art spaces represent a multiplicity of geo, economic and historical politics that we have been navigating. Spaces in Johannesburg that have been left barren by the State because they need to focus on “Land reform” or corruption have left the economy of space in the hands of the white Jewish elite and foreign investors. This is the story of gentrification, and capitalism. We do however recognize that in some way or another we have the agency to not only transform these spaces but occupy them in ways that speak to the current condition of Johannesburg spaces turning into trendy gentrified hubs for the White South African elite. Spaces such as Keleketla! Library are examples to follow. We can exist in parallel to these histories so we can simultaneously contribute to the narrative.

(Simnikiwe) Most art spaces in this city weren’t even made with us in mind. They are not for us. Most of them are white spaces (in their physicality, aesthetics; in their economy, their audiences, their collectors etc.). Thus, by proxy, being a black female artist means we have to navigate and find/immerse ourselves within our own spaces. And a space like Keleketla! Library, which has become our home away from home, has proved to be our point of departure.

As a collective, what are you trying to bring into Johannesburg’s art spaces or understandings of the purpose of art?

(Dineo) I don’t think we’re trying to bring in anything in particular or doing something special , we’re just trying to do our own thing. We’re still trying to understand and navigate these spaces too.

(Simnikiwe) I don’t think I even know to be honest. We are still finding our feet, trying to figure things out. But we are hoping whatever smallanyana things we do can help black [arts] narratives to exist and be visible

Check out Title in Transgression on Instagram to find out more about where they will be next.

‘All Our Shit Is In Europe’ tote bag produced in collaboration with Danger Gevaar Ngozi

7 December 2017
Lebohang Kganye // living memory

Looking for a way to live in her late mother’s memories, Johannesburg-based artist Lebohang Kganye produced the work Ke Lefa Laka which was awarded the Contemporary African Photography (CAP) Prize. Ke Lefa Laka translates to ‘my inheritance’, and this was the starting point for her work. By embodying her mother through images she is able to combine the past, the present and memories of her mother without any chronological order being made to dominate the work. Kganye put on her mother’s clothes and inserted herself into photographs of her mother before she passed away, allowing herself to occupy two moments at once. Here she quite literally inserts her body into images to live in her mother’s memories.

Primarily a photographer, her work also incorporates sculpture and performance and focuses on the thematics of memory, the archive, narrative, storytelling and how photography relates to these.

‘Setupung sa kwana hae II’

Recognizing that family photographs are a documentation of personal and collective narratives, and how they are displayed projects a particular way in which those narratives unfold, Kganye also addresses how their construction can be performative and used to channel ideals around “family-ness”.

While Ke Lefa Laka was produced in 2013, it highlights one of the key aspects her practice, which is to make connections between macro level political and social issues and personal/familial narratives. By visiting places that her family had lived and by finding family photographs she was able to explore the stories told to her by her grandmother, and uncover the story of her grandfather, mother, clan names, and her own story. These stories involved the multiple times her family had to move due to apartheid laws and social conditions, and how her family surname changed with these moves. This work culminated in a reflection on larger political and social conditions by highlighting how the personal is political. This premise is carried through her artistic practice.

‘Ka mose wa malomo kwana 44 I’

‘The last supper’

27 September 2017
Mike Leather’s vintage biker’s boutique: A homage to Joburg’s vibrant 80s punk past

One of my favorite hidden gems in Joburg just so happens to also be a “tribute to South Africa’s punk and alternative scene” past! On Jan smuts, opposite the Goodman gallery lies an entrance surrounded by a leather garments display, and if you’re lucky you will see a black and chrome bike with dangling tassels outside the entrance. A “punk rock” machine on two wheels signals that the owner and founder of the store Add-Vintage, Mike Leather, is currently on site.

Born and raised in Joburg, Mike would become involved in leather works by honing his craft at Joburg’s Market Theatre, making his own clothes. “Back then I Started making styles for myself. Me and my Bro were punk’s back then.

“I used to have a Mohawk and arm bands with the studs.” He had (and from just looking at his amazing array of jackets in the store has kept) a grand collection of 80’s leather punk jackets. He knew the styles and made sure to keep up to date with the underground trends,

“It was the 80’s. Anything I had in those days that was different you could not buy. You had to make your own style”. Punk’s like Mike and his brother, Quiet, would frequent Yeoville and Hillbrow at that time. Their friends would hang around their crib to start the evening’s festivities and then they would make their way to the main jol. “We partied in ‘Subway’ downtown and at ‘Doors’ which was based in Carlton Centre. Everybody was there as there were few places within the scene you could go. People from overseas would come to South Africa to hang around Newtown. That was the place to hang around to find that style of people. The jols, the homies all stayed downtown”.

These were the places where their friends were every Saturday and Saturday. It was here that you would find the movement. The Joburg Punk movement was downtown near the market theatre. “That’s why when one said they wanted to ‘hang out’ you would find your homies, the parties, the clothes; everything you needed was there”.

I was blessed to have Mike give me a historical account of his own style. Where he came from it was all about creating things, your own style and from there he begun making his own leather shoes and clothes. Eventually I’m wearing the gear and people were like they want it! So I would make for myself and then people started ordering from me and that’s where it started.

He explains what the trends in the 80’s were like to me: “So many things are happening today. Back then, those days in the 80’s you didn’t see somebody different. Back then a black punk with white boys playing rock, jamming to punk music, it was something very different for people out there. People saying things like ‘they are drug addicts’. They didn’t know what to think about us. Also it wasn’t easy because being different at a time that was mostly formal.” His style was too spaced out for the crowd, a mainstream crowd deep within the cultural yolk of apartheid.

“Now my style and that of my bro was more English punk. We’d hang out in subways. This was something double different to see at the time. As both black men who were also enjoying the music with white people. It wasn’t easy to be different back then and also hang around with the white boys. It was very tough. The way people look at you and think of you. They thought punks are Satanists. There would be this thing where being dressed up in black would get goths and punks put together, stereotyped as being the same and being called ‘Satanist’. Those that were different were put into the same stereotype regardless of their race.

Mike explains how today it’s much easier to be “different”. For him the different styles can be seen on TV and you can easily get them at the stores. “Back then there was no TV. If you did your style you did it by yourself. The underground movement styles changed due to introduction of TV”. The cheapening of the devices created a new advent of access to the various styles within popular culture. But with TV also meant an increase in access to cheaper garments that reflected this popular style.

“My clientele understand me. Back then with punks and gothics you knew exactly how to move with the trends or your style. Punk was doc martin, studs, leather jackets. Those are the things you did. Now it’s not as distinct. TV dictates the styles. Today I have a variety of people coming into my store. When I young with bro we used to have a shop in Hillbrow called ‘Kingdom Leather’ that was front opposite the New Metro. I used to ride when I was young. I was a Punk, a rider, the same movement that I came from. These were the clientele that we served”. These are the clientele that he continues to serve today.

When one enters his ADD-vintage store on Jan Smuts you are entering a period in South Africa that’s not really talked about. “Not much has been different in my store from back then. I knew exactly who my clientele was, the punks, the rockers, the riders. You don’t see punks, goths like you did back then”.

He explains how today you find people who don’t know themselves and their style. I would even add that we are over exposed to mainstream trends. “Mostly, today you get stuff anywhere and so much of the style depends on the person. You can get the stuff Chinese made but not with quality”. For Mike it’s the quality that defines his brand and I would even say ‘the style’.

He describes how the people he sees nowadays are those with a very strong sense of style, the new punks, those who dress differently. “When they come into my store they say ‘WOW, I haven’t seen a shop like this for many years’, you know what I mean? This reminds them of stores like those found in London Camden market. The punks and stuff are still happening now but not like here”. Mike’s store presents the style as it was done back then. He explains how some people still want something specially made. “They want to go somewhere you know the stuff is quality. This is where the difference comes with my shop”.

“Others are afraid of the shop. They don’t know about the jackets, about the movement. So this is what is happening.” Today his clientele is not so well defined and so all sorts may enter his store. His store is a representation of a time of defiance. Those who know their punk, rock and style history will know of the importance of such to those who would wear their defiance! It’s overwhelming to enter this store as it also speaks to a very specific time in style history. If you look carefully you can even observe some leather bondage gear (of highest quality of course), a skull helmet and plenty of metal stud jewelry.

This style is experienced sensually within the store! One is greeted with the all-consuming scent of leather. Make no mistake this store is all about the leather, bottom to top, and its shelves brimming with fine leather vintage and biking goods. One wall houses a beautiful collection of white cow boy leather boots that would make any Dolly Parton fan flush with excitement. His store is one of quality, long lasting wear that will not only test the strength of time but test the wearer’s grit in being able to keep the movement alive!

The shop can be found on 144^th street on Jan Smuts Avenue
in Johannesburg (opposite the Goodman gallery). Operating hours are from 9am to 5 on weekdays. You can also contact Mike directly on
0837282274 and he will gladly assist you with your queries.

8 February 2017