A few years ago, I wrote about what I called the Somzification of the South African queer identity. The idea is premised on Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s idea of the danger of the single story, the notion that we risk erasing essential identifiers of people’s lives or people themselves if we relax into telling a one-dimensional…
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…
Gaika‘s collision of dancehall, grime and ominous drone creates a charged atmosphere of dread. As audiences to his recent performances in South Africa can attest, the UK musician and visual artist’s work powerfully evokes themes of confusion, terror and exploitation. Via email, Gaika described this intensity as a response to the confusing social reality of the…
Described as Family Tree‘s first lady, Nadia Nakai‘s guiding vision is to be the best rapper on the continent. All the decisions she makes with regards to her music and business ventures channel the energy that fuels the fruition of that vision. “That’s what I use as my benchmark. That is why I started working…
The Sartists – One of the first collective’s whose name imprinted onto my young mind when I situated myself within the man-made concrete mounds of the bitter-sweet creative city of Johannesburg. A very organic process considering that this group stood out as one of inimitable expression characterized by disruptive, radical thought and one of a…
I assume everyone reading this website knows who Nonku Phiri is. Well, you know her work, at least. The multi-talented creative has featured on a handful of hits, both as rapper Jung Freud and as ‘herself’, has collabed with some of the most respected names in the game, and put out two vastly different singles,…
Emanuel Admassu was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and is a founding partner of the AD-WO design practice based between Brooklyn and Providence together with Jen Wood. With over five years of teaching experience in multiple programs at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation as well as at Rhode Island School of…
“TO THE HOMIES WHO’VE HATED DOUBTED AND LAUGHED, WHO COME TO US NOW FOR AFFILIATION, VALIDATION AND ANY FORM OF COME UP, THIS GARMENT IS NOT FOR YOU… SPINELESS MOTHERFUCKERS. YÔNGN LAYZEE”, reads the first card in a stack held together by a rubber band and placed diagonally next to a pair of black sunglasses,…
Cities are alive. In the same way that bodies renew themselves by creating new cells, so are buildings, streets and whole areas refurbished, and gentrified to fit middle class standards of city living. Architectural plans and city mapping has been digitized to allow for life-like images of future spaces. In Africa this is often tied…
Cape Town has been described as a union of culture, cuisine, and landscapes. “There’s nowhere quite like Cape Town, a singularly beautiful city crowned by the magnificent Table Mountain National Park. Human creativity is also self-evident here – it’s one of the things that made the city a World Design Capital in 2014. From the…
As I walked in the room I could hear Moozlie‘s voice bubbling in the air. We sat down together to have a conversation about her career and her latest project VERSUS which will be dropping on Friday. The slight raspy texture to her voice adds a subtle sexiness that even my recorder couldn’t help but…
Bee Diamondhead is a name so molded into the South African fashion scene that it is almost difficult to distinguish the two as separate entities. During her rise in fashion as a stylist, editor and creative director there has been a great deal of media coverage on her background and work. In this article we…
