Do not miss Kudzanai at the Obert!
You can count on the Obert gallery in Melrose Arch to give you cutting edge, visionary African artists. DO NOT MISS the expo of one of the artworlds rising golden boys, exiled Zimbabwean Kudzanai Chiurai. He’s in his mid twenties with a brilliant future ahead, get to the Obert before the 30 September. “graceland” is chiurai’s highly anticipated third solo exhibition and follows his acclaimed sell-out exhibitions “the revolution will be televised (2004)” and “y propaganda (2005)” and his participation in the dakar biennale in 2006. chiurai is an innovative and controversial young artist who has been banned from his home country of zimbabwe for his politically inspired caricatures of president robert mugabe. reminiscent of basquiat, chiurai’s mixed media works are intricately layered with stenciled characters, poetry and graffiti. his works have recently been procured by top private and public collectors including bhp billiton in london. this exhibition will consist of nine new, variously scaled mixed media works that explore pertinent issues related to mass media, inner city rejuvenation and xenophobia. More on Kudzanai: born in 1981 in zimbabwe, kudzanai chiurai is an internationally acclaimed young artist now living and working in south africa. he was the first black student to graduate with a BA (fine art) from the university of pretoria. regarded as part of the “born free” generation in zimbabwe because he was born one year after the country’s independence from rhodesia, chiurai’s early work focused on the political, economic and social strife in his homeland. seminal works like “presidential wallpaper” depicted zimbabwean president robert mugabe as a sell-out and led to chiurai’s exile from zimbabwe. chiurai’s large mixed media works now tackle some of the most pertinent issues facing southern africa such as xenophobia, displacement and black empowerment. his paintings confront viewers with the psychological and physical experience of inner-city johannesburg, the continent’s most cosmopolitan melting pot where thousands of exiles, refugees and asylum-seekers battle for survival alongside the never-ending swell of newly urbanized south africans. the actuality of these environs is reinforced by chiurai’s use of photographic transfer. boldly stenciled figures and anonymous text provide running commentary, leading viewers on a journey through his intricately painted turn-of-the century buildings, bustling streets and congested transit...
Mkonto sessions presents the Bantu Biko show
We’re a little busy at the mo so please excuse our lack of constant flowing content like you love it but we promise to be back and at it in Oct. So for now, we’re just gonna tell it like it is – click on flyers for more info: Mkonto Sessions presents the Bantu Biko show at Horror Cafe (Newton) 28th September 2007 Admission: R50 DJ C- LIVE FIFI DJ BIONIC Herby Dangerous LEVI PON THE MIC RANTOBOKO CUBA DJ Funtime and...
Represent Recommends: A Love for Darfur
You may remember Tumi’s call for action and support in mid-July, appealing to all SA artists to do their bit to highlight the current horrific situation in the Darfur Region. Huge props to Tumi who has pursued his calling, gathering the likes of 340ml, the under-heard fabulous vocalist Lois, HHP, Siphokazi and Khethi to join him in concert at “A Love for Darfur” on the 15 September 2007 at Bassline. Tickets are R100, do your bit friends, Represent Afrika. Click on the flyer for more: 11 September 2007 – Since 2003 the Darfur region in Sudan, a fellow African country has been plunged into a bloody and disturbing conflict that has seen 200,000 people killed and 2 million displaced according to U.N figures. In scenes frightfully resembling Rwanda, villages have been depopulated, looted, burnt to the ground; non-combatants have suffered dismemberment and brutal killings at the hand of militias. Acclaimed South African artist, Tumi Molekane together with fellow South African musicians are currently making a public appeal to raise awareness about the plight of the Sudanese people and to assist in providing funds to purchase supplies, medication and food for those who are displaced. ‘A Love for Dar4ur’, a concert taking place on Saturday, 15 September 2007 at Bassline in Newtown, Johannesburg will see some of South Africa’s best artists unite in showing solidarity to the plight of the people of Darfur, in raising awareness and much needed financial support for tents and vital food supplies. Also a secondary aim is to demystify the idea of benefits or charity, to simplify the process of which one could change a reality by just participating The breath-taking confirmed line-up include Tumi & the Volume , 340ml, Tumi & Papercutt, Zubz, Khethi, Kerryn Rogers , HHP, Levi pon de Mic, Njthapedi, Slikour, DJ Kenzhero, Siphokazi, Koldproduk and DJ Bionic. A series of Public Service Announcements (PSAs) will be initiated following the ‘A Love of Dafur’ concert. The PSAs will feature some of South Africans finest actors, television personalities, radio presenters, musicians and high profiled personalities who have been moved by this issue.These PSA’s feature Lebo Mashile, Sello Maake ka Ncube, Kyla of Freshly Ground, Sugar Smaxx of Skwatta Kamp, Andile Carelse, Akin Omotoso, Siphokazi, Lira, Lee Kasumba, Chris Cube, Toni Goroga, 340ml, Khethi and they were directed by Vincent Moloi and will be flighted for the first time at the event. Tumi appeals to his fellow South Africans ‘I am not a soldier, nor am I an aid worker. I am an artist making music inspired greatly by the beauty and troubled disturbances of this soil. Let’s get together and extend our...
Represent Review: Soweto Wine Festival
The Matrix get’s his first shot at wine-tasting and find’s himself seduced by the sensuality of it all. Sounds like something you don’t want to miss next year! Sharpile Reuben for always Representin’ – particularly when your assignment is so awful *wink*. See some pics here. This weekend Soweto was encased in charcoal roasted casks fresh from the Mother City as Cape Town’s best and not so best wine cellars eagerly perspired and promoted, hoping to gain favour with the pockets of the wealthy, novice, bargain hunters and the enthused! On Saturday night the Standard Bank sponsored grounds of the University of Johannesburg in the heart of Black Diamond economy were sprawling like a fishermen’s Mediterranean village at the Standard Bank Soweto Wine Festival 2007. Wine connoisseurs from all over the Rand sipped the fine, bold and crystal liquid as famous Stellenbosch cellars like Kanonkop (Canon Hill) Wine Estate served their best of the best. Kanonkop wine is gently and slowly fermented and aged to perfection in fire roasted-wooden casks for more than two years in order to give it it’s smooth full-body and the fervent after-taste that just makes you crave even more of their famous Cabernet Sauvignon. For me, the night was too young and choices too many for one to be over-indulging in just a few samples of cape liquid gold, especially when I took into account the number of Wine Estates represented at the event and all that tasting that still needed to be done. I wanted to have a well balanced and well informed cask (Pun intended!) of the entire event… and thus I prepared myself for what was inevitable with the task at hand – a heavy babalas! Representahs! I don’t know about you, but my knowledge of wine (before Saturday that is) was limited to what I saw on the store racks and the self-crowned cook shows on BBC-Food. However, right now i believe that i’m in a more informed state to “school” you all about the age old art of distillery that is Wine Making. Okay, now (what did I jot down…okay here it is), apparently, wine unlike beer or spirits can’t be fermented (this is wine jargon for crushing grapes and filtering the liquid with a mixture of other stabilizers in huge wooden barrels called Casks, more like those in the Jack Daniels Ads on TV, Ah…you see not so difficult is it?), at just any location and not all vines are suited for Wine making or rather superior quality wine making. I was also informed that you specifically need Mediterranean weather in order for the fields to yield delicious grapes, hence the Cape’s winter rainfall being well suited for South Africa’s...
SA doccie on show in the Big Apple
Editorista remembers seeing Zim Ngqawana playing jazz in the Netherlands at a festival, it was a moment of such pride tempered with intense home sickness for home sweet Africa as Zim’s music washed over the room, captivating the audience. Any African’s or anyone interested in African Jazz and our stories in general in and around New York City, catch Zim live as he sets the tone for the SA jazz doccie entitled “Unyazi of the Bushveld” that’s showing at the “Columbia Harlem Festival of Global Jazz Documentary Film” festival: African Noise Foundation is proud to announce the selection of a South African documentary production for screening in the prestigious Columbia University Columbia Harlem Festival of Global Jazz Documentary Film. The 29 september screening will be preceded by a concert of the Zim Ngqawana Quartet on 28 september. “Unyazi of the Bushveld” (2007). Aryan Kaganof, director (South Africa). 45 min. The Zulu word “unyazi” can be translated into English as “lightning,” an apposite double image of rupture and new beginnings for UNYAZI 2005, Africa’s first festival of electronic music, the brainchild of new music composer Dimitri Voudouris. Aryan Kaganof’s documentary on this singular historical event is suitably non-linear in structure, as it explores the complex relationship, both assumed and actual, among technology, the African and Afrodiasporic worlds, and the multiculturalism that mediates them. We are presented with a vision freed from the romantically anti-technological stances of the early Nègritude movement (and that of 1960s American black cultural nationalisms), and the concomitant assumptions that nothing of a technological nature can emerge from a black-ruled world. But we are never far from South Africa’s recent history. Until this festival, jazz drummer Louis Moholo, exiled since the early 1960s, had never been on the campus of Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand–or rather, as he commented drily, “We came, but they chased us off with dogs. That was...
Represent Trend: Melk van Daisy de Melker.
Editorista was offered a sip of the most delicious yet lethal drink at a recent Spring bash. Called after Jozi’s most notorious female serial killer, Daisy de Melker, the drink has a latent yet subtle kick. The chocolate flavoured milky beverage has a lumpy but not unpleasant consistency (to most). It’s made from a secret recipe that supposedly includes a large quantity of herbs – and we’re not talking Sage. *smack* Baie Lekker Daisy. Can anyone tell us a little more about a DDM and maybe how this Jozi trend got started? We like...
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