Bubblegum Club

Tag: sexism

  • Manteiga infuses Batuk with drama

    Manteiga infuses Batuk with drama

    With a Mozambican father, who always had his guitar on hand ready to play a song, and a South African mother, both with great storytelling abilities, Carla Fonseca, the birth name of Batuk’s frontwoman Manteiga, was exposed to and had a great appreciation for the dramatic arts from a young age. “You know your aunts and your uncles, when they start telling the story of how somebody got robbed or whatever the story is, there is quite a lot of drama. I guess my interest in any form of dramatic arts started there and I consider music to be a form of dramatic arts as well.”

    Moving between Mozambique and South Africa as a child before settling in the township of Reiger Park in the East Rand of Johannesburg around the age of 6, Manteiga went to a high school for the arts where she focused on theatre and went on to study further in the medium at university.

    It is through her work in theatre that the idea to collaborate with Spoek Mathambo and Aero Manyelo came about. The two producers had already decided to collaborate when Manteiga invited Spoek to a production she had written & directed and in which she performed six different characters. “One of the characters sang. I guess [Spoek] saw the ability in me to change characters, write and sing.” Initially only joining them in studio to work on a few tracks, Manteiga would soon join the group as an official member.

    The Manteiga alter-ego serves a practical as well as an artistic purpose. “Manteiga helps me separate my music from my theatre work. It helps me think from a different mind space. Manteiga is the music maker in me and she is against sexism, homophobia, xenophobia. She is for equal rights and everybody having freedom in their lives. Whether it be freedom against war, coming from two countries where we’ve experienced extreme violence. A stand against violence against women.” explains Carla who believes that bringing this philosophy into the message of the group is of significance. “I think it’s important for artists to not just make work that’s just flimsy. It’s your responsibility to speak about subjects that are important to you.”

    Manteiga says it was her “philosophy on women needing to be in the forefront and needing to be empowered more and allowed to lead a lot more” that saw her take charge of Batuk, leading decision around visuals, storytelling and representing the group in the press.

    Coming from a theatre rather than a music background sometimes challenges Manteiga when it comes to writing. “It’s very different. I was kind of given a crash course on how things work [in music]. Sometimes I write stories and then from there I can take out bits and pieces and put it together.”

    Having released two albums and an EP over the last three years Manteiga says that she feels like she’s grown more confident in both her writing and singing abilities. “On the first album I wasn’t singing much. Nandi was a collaborator in the project and she’s got an incredible voice. I have a voice, but I was too shy to express it. But on this new album I got the balls to sing and that was a big step for me and I grew in that respect.”

    On both 2018 releases, “Kasi Royalty” and “Move!”, Manteiga and Spoek decided to pursue a more South African sound reminiscent of their township days. “There’s more Xhosa, Zulu and Afrikaans. I rap in Afrikaans, I tell my stories of what it’s like to be a coloured girl from the township. We want to appeal to a South African market but we just wanted to take our Kasi roots, Spoek being from Soweto, and make something that was true to us and nostalgic for us.”

    While hoping for local appeal, Batuk’s support is largely overseas, with their upcoming tour “Again She Reigns” spanning the European continent, save for a couple of local shows. Manteiga is excited for the tour which begins at the end of September. “It’s a lot more dramatic and theatrical. I’m incorporating my theatre roots into the show. There are different characters and the music is kind of part of a character’s story.”

    Speaking on the lack of support locally Manteiga says: “I think there’s a lot of corruption involved. In order for your song to be on the radio you have to bribe people. There’s a whole payola system in South Africa and if you participate in that you get more people listening to your music, exposure, etc. potentially shows. South Africa is interested in hip hop right now but they’re also interested in a lot of other genres. …It’s really just what appeals at the time. I’m not disappointed at all. I think for what we’ve done in the last 3 years I’m really proud and excited for what’s to come and what has been. I’m not complaining at all.”

    Batuk continues to work hard at pushing its music locally. “We print a whole lot of CDs and hand them out to taxi drivers, people in parks listening to music, we try as much as we can in South Africa to spread the music.” But Manteiga says that it is up to promoters to book them.

    In the meantime, fans can anticipate a new music video from the group dropping in the near future. “We just started a conversation with a director, we need to decide which song we really want to push, maybe we’ll leave it up to fans to decide, not sure, but we’re looking to release a music video soon.”

    Despite having dropped two releases in 2018, Batuk is looking to release new material next year. “Spoek Mathambo is a machine, he’s always in the studio, always making music, so we’re not going to rush this year but next year we’ll definitely be releasing music. The way I work, I constantly want to produce. I want to produce and not stop and wait for people to decide, maybe the album will only achieve what we want it to achieve in 3 years’ time and I don’t think we should stop for that.”

    Credits: 

    Photography & Styling: Jamal Nxedlana

    MUA: Kristina Nicol

    Hair Stylist: Nomasonto Malefo

    Photographic Assistants: Lebogang Ramfate and Darnelle Thompson

     

  • Future 76 // In dealing with the colonial wound

    Future 76 // In dealing with the colonial wound

    Coloniality describes the hidden process of erasure, devaluation, and disavowing of certain human beings, ways of thinking, ways of living, and of doing in the world – that is, coloniality as a process of inventing identifications – then for identification to be decolonial it needs to be articulated as “des-identification” and “re-identification, which means it is a process of delinking

    This statement by Walter Mignolo during a 2014 interview with Rubén Gaztambide-Fernández describes the pervasive nature of coloniality. Certain parallels can be drawn between the tragic events of June 16th, 1976 and the recent Fallist Movement. These historical moments have enacted  ruptures of resistance. Recognizing moments of erasure is crucial to redefining historical narratives and addressing systemic disparities of power. However, ‘the voice’ of youth is not merely a homogenized entity. Issues of representation require a nuanced and considered approach – allowing passage to spaces that have been previously inaccessible. Within the context of contemporary art in South Africa, opportunities for self-representation and exploration are often scarce.

    It is in response to this, that Bubblegum Club has created an annual micro-residency to cultivate the talent of young artists. A group of four womxn have been selected for this years programme – to participate in a series of workshops, close conversation and ultimately exhibit a new body of work at the end of June. The programme has been conceptually framed around decolonial options – to tentatively consider and critique this notion beyond the buzzword.

    Jemma Rose, a self-identified visual activist and Gemini, uses her camera to capture daily realities. She also uses it as a mutual point of contact –  a device to generate encounters with people. Photographic work is in part a family tradition, it has always had an element of familiarity to it, as both her father and grandfather have engaged with the medium.

    Through her work she often works with themes of queerness and queer identity as well as drawing attention to mental health issues. Jemma notes that there are some performative qualities to her photographic work and usually focuses on using her images to convey a message relevant to her experiences. She is interested in locating herself and her work within a larger context based on her personal subjectivities.

    “I initially thought of ‘decolonisation’ in relation to breaking things down. I’m starting to realize that it’s much more than that. There are so many things behind it that you have to unravel…masculinity, heteronormativity and sexism are also all part of it. You need to slowly start unraveling it so that you can see the bigger picture.”

    This sentiment echoed by Mignolo “Patriarchy and racism are two pillars of Eurocentric knowing, sensing, and believing. These pillars sustain a structure of knowledge.” (2014). Thus through untangling the history of colonization, racisim and the patriarchy must also be addressed.

    Boipelo Khunou is currently in her final year of Fine Arts at Wits. “It’s been an interesting journey trying to find out what this so-called-fine-art-world is – what it means to be making art and making work.” This process can often be dissolusioning, especially once you realise how the elements of capital and nepotism are entertwined in the system.

    As a multi-diciplinary artist, Boipelo focuses her practice on photography, print and digital media. Thematically she works through ideas of personal power. “I use to reflect about the things that I experience. Experience is one of the most important parts of my work.” Through her work she investigates the kinds of spaces it is possible to find and claim power. She describes how oftentimes it’s within the walls of the institution that power is forcibly relinquished and autonomy is lost.

    “I didn’t know anything about decolonization until Fees Must Fall.” During the movement, the concept gained an immense amount of traction. Pedigogical systems and western epistemology within the university and beyond were challenged. “After the protests, so many people I know went through this weird depression because they realized that institutions have so much power, but what does that mean for people who want to dedicate their lives to decolonial practices?.”

    “The interesting thing is to actually see how you can put decolonization into practice. You can do all the readings, go to the talks, go to all these places that advocate for it, but what does it mean to practice it every day? I think that it is a very complex thing, it’s something that challenges me. You realise that there are so many aspects of your being and how you operate in life that you need to figure out how to prevent institutions and conditioned ideas to creep back into your life – it’s a constant battle.”

    Natalie Paneng is a 21-year-old artist and student. Her background in set design gives her a unique application of her use of space. Her work is often located virtually as she explores what it means to engage with the internet as a black womxn. The mode in which she does this is often through the use of alter egos. Hello Nice is a character she created on youtube and utilizes the ‘vape wave’ aesthetic.

    Recently Natalie created a zine called Internet Babies, it chronicals the profiles of five girls: TrendyToffy @107_, Black Linux otherwise known as the Mother of Malware, Silverlining CPU, Fuchsia Raspberry Pi and Coco Techno Butter. It explores their relationship to digital space and how they’re the “fiber of the internet.”

    She decribes how, “trying to find myself is like the decolonization of myself. Learning how to push those boundries and be more radical as well as owning the need for decolonization and acknowledging that it’s going to have to start with me.”

    Tash Brown is a young painter who approaches the concept of White Suburbia as well as investigating her place and participation within that space. While working through the lens of decolonization she describes how “white suburbia becomes a distortion of reality”, one which is also often still racially segregated. Her distorted paintings are often a grotesque depiction of the suburbs.

    As a white artist, she is critical of her own voice. Noting that, “it’s a time and a space in South Africa where black artists should be prioritized. So I guess I’ve struggled to find myself relevance in the art world, but through the critique of my own cultural issues and the problematics is a way that I can approach it, without having my voice crowding out other voices.”

    Credits:

    Photography & Styling: Jamal Nxedlana

    Makeup: Orli Meiri

    Photography and styling assistant: Lebogang Ramfate

  • In Bloom // Not just another white cube exhibition

    In Bloom is Ja.’s first exhibition held at the KZNSA Gallery. The exhibition features 11 South African artists but what differentiates it from the traditional exhibition is that each featured artist’s work received a personalized backdrop. I spoke to the curators for the exhibition, Niamh Walsh-Vorster, Youlendree Appasamy and Dave Mann to find out more about the featured artists, their curatorial strategy for the exhibition as well as the work on display

    The team tells me that the exhibition came about after their launch of their free studio and workshop space within The Green Camp Gallery. After this launch, they joked about doing an exhibition that became a serious goal for them and was met with the generous sharing of space and resources provided by the KZNSA gallery. They continue to tell me that they decided to pursue the idea to have their first exhibition, as they wanted to move from an URL space to an irl space.

    Expressing that there is no overarching concept for the exhibition the team explains that the works featured celebrate a variety of art forms such as poetry, short stories, paintings, illustrations, films, photography, and graffiti. Having read the artists’ statements, however, I feel like there is a definite link to artists creating work that speak about topics such as sexism, identity as well as mental health.

    ‘Fantasma’ by Hannah Shone

    This is illustrated for example when looking at the artist’s statement by Nosipho Nxele where she explains her work ‘Shared Greatness’ as follows, “The greatest threat to women and by extension humanity is the growth and acceptance of male chauvinistic, illiberal and brutal culture of hawkishness. This system then requires that women raise up their voices to empower themselves and those without any voice to fight against society’s systems that belittle women. Meaning we are greater together than apart. My inspiration [for the piece] was drawn from the great saying of Pakistani activist for female education, Malala Yousafzai: ‘I raise up my voice – not so I can shout, but so that those without a voice can be heard. We cannot succeed when half of us are held back’. The illustration embodies the spirit and passion of Mahala.” This statement speaks not only of sexism but feminine identity as well as solidarity among women.

    The team tell me that the title of the exhibition ‘In Bloom’ was chosen as the artists’ work in the exhibition represents an exploration and engagement with one’s identity. “Coming into bloom is a difficult act but the bloom itself is a beautiful thing. Even though some of the work unpacks uncomfortable themes it’s through the experiences of young artists who are finding imaginative ways of expression.” The title is also a reflection of the opening during spring, a time that flowers are in bloom.

    Artists for the exhibition were selected by medium and geographic region as an attempt to showcase work that was as far reaching as possible by means of concept and geographical location of the artists.

    ‘Blazers’ by Shalom Mushwana

    When asked about the curatorial strategy that was followed for this exhibition they explain that the exhibition features both written and visual work and expresses that finding a way to situate literature within a conventionally visual space was a fun challenge for them. They continue to explain that written works were incorporated in the form of postcards, small zines, a poem draped down a stairway entrance of the Mezzanine and film-based work created by the guest visual editor, Mandisa Buthelezi.

    Focussing on various points of entry and layouts for visual works they experimented with placement for the works that fell under this category. With the help of graffiti artist, Kev Sevin backdrops were painted for each artist’s work allowing them to come into their own as distinct clusters the team expresses. This strategy alone lends a different element to the ‘In Bloom’ exhibition and aids in tying the work rather seamlessly.

    The team express their hopes for ‘In Bloom’ as follows, “We hope that it contributes to the careers of the artists involved, as well as inspires more artists to create new work. And also, to show that it’s possible to pull off an exhibition on a shoestring budget that’s successful and engaging without the usual white cube nonsense.”

    ‘In Bloom’ opened on the 26 September ran up until the 15 October in the Mezzanine space at the KZNSA gallery in Durban. Featured artists included Robyn Perros, Hannah Shone, Nosipho Nxele, Shalom Mushwana, Dani O’Neill, Andy Mkosi, Maya Surya Pillay, Werner Goss-Ross, Kev Sevin and Julie Nxadi with a visual adaptation of ‘This is Not a Sad Story’.

    ‘Rat Dog’ and ‘Existential Zebra’ by Werner Goss-Ross