The Arts
About this page
The arts section is joining up with Ja. Magazine, an online platform that collects, curates and celebrates the work of local creatives, with a handmade twist. Together with Ja. Magazine, The Journalist Arts page will bring you interviews, reviews and profiles from arts and music festivals around the country. We bring you interviews with upcoming legends and community artists while providing history and context. We do this by celebrating the unique power of the talented men and women who have strengthened the creative fabric of our society through the ages.
Mancoba in a class of his own
Phindile Xaba The late Ernest Mancoba, painter and sculptor, should be to South Africans as Van Gogh is to the Dutch and Picasso is to the Spanish. He, like others, have for too long been excluded from the South African narrative. He is considered to be in a class of his own and yet his work is not sufficiently studied at South African universities or art schools. The father of writer Njabulo Ndebele, Nimrod Ndebele, a playwright and friend, is known to have described Mancoba as the leading...
In defiance of prejudice
Zubeida Jaffer [intro]South African soprano Pumeza Matshikiza has come home to present a special solo concert at the Roodepoort Theatre on 2 November 2021. She will sing a selection of opera arias and traditional South African songs from her current repertoire. [/intro] I was fortunate to be invited to preview the show with family and friends at the theatre on Friday 15 October 2021. She and her accompanying pianist Paul Ferreira received several standing ovations from the enthusiastic...
Art and the fight for freedom
The events of 21 March 1960 in Sharpeville forced South Africa’s artists to create work that responded to the political moment. Many used their creativity to bolster the liberation movement.
Kadaf opens up about his hit single and fighting GBV
Besides music, the artist is involved in the national gender-based #ActNow Campaign. The campaign was formed by black men who decided to take a stand against the ongoing Gender-Based Violence in South Africa.
Myesha Jenkins 1948 – 2020
Poet, performer, activist and extraordinary human being
Forging ahead in new terrain
Cape Cultural Collective adapts to conditions imposed by pandemic
The Crown
A short story set in the time of the pandemic
Tsitsi Dangarembga and writing about pain and loss in Zimbabwe
Writing a pain body and also reading such a body are acts of resistance and triumph
Linton Kwesi Johnson gave poetry back to the people
Poet who made black “cool” in Britain wins 2020 Pen Pinter Prize
The world is dancing to South Africa’s Jerusalema
Master KG’s hit a feel-good song for all!
How Zulu radio dramas subverted apartheid’s grand design
Prof Liz Gunner [intro]In Johannesburg, during the Sophiatown era of the 1950s, gangsters would routinely order a writer or journalist like Can Themba or Bloke Modisane, to recite Shakespeare to them on street corners.[/intro] For a time, Shakespeare became part of the rhetoric of the streets. One of the favourite requests was for the revolutionary funeral oration by Mark Anthony, in Julius Caesar: “Friends, Romans, Countrymen…” This may be because the writer and broadcaster King Edward...
Musical masters fuse Western and traditional music
Michelle Galloway [intro]A South African composer, Michael Blake and Ugandan composer Justinian Tamusuza, talk about the fusion of western and traditional music, cultural appropriation and finding their “voice”.[/intro] Justinian Tamusuza is a Ugandan composer of contemporary classical music. His music combines elements of traditional Ugandan music and Western music. He is based at the Department of Performing Arts and Film (PAF) at Makerere University. Michael Blake is a South African...
Moon people: An interview with Nuotama Bodomo
On the 50th anniversary of humans landing on the moon, we take you back to Zambia’s attempt to achieve that feat
Bringing our art back will be the beginning of a new dawn
European countries must return looted African art
Whispering Truth To Power
Staff Writer [intro]Whispering Truth To Power, Shameela Seedat’s documentary about Thuli Madonsela’s last year as South Africa’s public protector, has been released and is available to watch on the streaming platform Showmax.[/intro] Whispering Truth To Power won the Special Jury Prize at Hot Docs, North America’s most important documentary festival, as well as awards at FESPACO, Luxor African Film Festival, and Jozi Film Festival, where it was also the opening night film, as it was at the...
Life’s complexities hit the stage
The Fishermen probes broken trust that eventually obliterates the Agwu family
Screams of women through art
A tour with deep emotions
Shades of black: An exhibition in colour
Invoking memory and curiosity
The kids who dreamed before Ramaphosa
The Arts take choristers into new space
Johnny Clegg: Rebel, intellectual, musician
Clegg was a dissident, a courageous man who confronted history and left an enduring mark on the world
After the scramble: It’s time to return Africa’s vinyl records
“No longer should music be removed from the country in large amounts”
The resilience of culture
[intro]The film The Sound of Masks explores dance, memory and the meaning of life, ancestry, culture and political struggle in postcolonial Mozambique.[/intro] "I am Atanásio Cosme Nyusi, son of my father, healer without master born on the Makonde plateau where there are bridges without rivers and the people believe in life after death." THE SOUND OF MASKS - TEASER DEC 2016 from Lionfish Productions on Vimeo. The Sound of Masks is a visual meditation on the nature of memory in postcolonial...
Graffiti is an eye-catching way to create lively spaces in cities
Creating meaningful and identifiable spaces
Art exhibition: When Dust Settles
Weaving together memory and history
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