Hentie van der Merwe Messenger 2007 Polyurethane Mask 68 x 46 x 23cm Stand 150cm A recent exhibition in South Africa provides an interesting comparison to Melbourne’s ‘jewellery of the forest’. Hentie van der Merwe has been studying the German archive of folktales collected from the Nama people in Namibia. She recognised this tales from [...]
Posts under ‘South Africa’
‘When the rats ate the flour resist’ – working with craft in Mozambique
From the Western Cape Craft Newsletter comes this fascinating tale by Amanda Youngleson about working as a design consultant in Mozambique. It’s a sober account of the challenges involved, but testament to great dedication. DESIGNING FOR DEVELOPMENT: THE CHALLENGE When product designing to assist development in the underdeveloped world, one works in a realm of [...]
Should we ‘uplift’ craft?
At the South Project gathering in Johannesburg last year, I organised a workshop on ways of exhibiting craft. The rationale emerged on a visit to the Johannesburg Art Gallery, and seeing the division between the shop and the gallery – black rural woman’s craft in the shop and white university educated video in the gallery. [...]
Post-Johannesburg – Numbo liya kade
Some time has elapsed since the gathering in Johannesburg. It still seems too soon to reflect fully on the event. It will be very interesting to see what emerges. It’s a challenge to maintain contact across time zones and cultures, but I’m hoping that we can build on the gathering in a substantial way. One [...]
The day the north beat the south – the Rugby World Cup in Soweto
Saturday began at the African Cultural Centre, where Benji Francis presented the raw work by nine young performers who each told the story of their lives for the first time to an audience. These were ordinary stories of people in townships. One was a boy who had shot his stepmother after daily beatings. Another was [...]
The hunt begins…
First thing this morning Clifford Charles dropped into the B&B and we went for a walk over the rocks. He told me that the South African reggae star Lucky Dube had been killed outside his home in Johannesburg. This seems particularly sad news given that one of the Dube clan, Hlengiwe Dube, was playing such an important role [...]
The sun moves in Soweto
Thursday was a more collective experience of Johannesburg. I set off on a bus with the other visitors associated with the South Project gathering. We were mostly Australians, with a few locals thrown into the mix. The director of the African Cultural Centre, Benji Francis, was our guide through Soweto. He explained to the bus [...]
Bring a little global warming to Soweto
Belle Primary School had been selected as the site for the South Kids activity of the gathering in Soweto. It is situated just next to the Hector Petersen Museum and its staff seemed very keen to be part of the event. The passion of their involvement took most of us by surprise. Emma Davies, Maree [...]
The mind of a Soweto taxi
I caught a taxi from Bree Street taxi centre in downtown Joburg. It was like a massive car park filled with taxis weaving in between queues of commuters. It took me about four questions before I found myself at the end of a queue. I was the sixteenth person in line, which is exactly the [...]
Things are brewing for south in Joburg
Mighta Makhurtle and Carlie Dibakoame present Suso to the ‘learners’ at Belle Primary School. Mighta manages the Credo Mutwa Place of Stories in Soweto and is part of the project team. Carlie is Principal of the Belle Primary School, where students are involved in workshops as part of the South Kids program Local coordinator of [...]
