ARTLOOKS & ARTLINES |
ISMAIL MAHOMED
Public artworks mark a new dawn in Oudtshoorn
ATKV Speelbos at KKNK 2018 PHOTO Hans van der Veen
T
Babbelagtig at KKNK 2018 PHOTO Hans van der Veen
he Klein Karoo Nasionale Kunstefees (KKNK
offensive slogans. It didn’t matter if you did not speak
National Arts Festival) debuted in 1994 with the
Afrikaans, you were still welcome. You could buy halaal
dawn of Nelson Mandela’s Rainbow Nation but
shawarmas alongside Karoo kudu-wors. The local Chinese
for several years after that, the Festival had a
migrants in the Western Cape even visited the Festival. A
chequered history which included beer cans and bottles being
mixed-race couple walking down Baron van Rheede Street no
thrown at Miriam Makeba when she appeared on stage at
longer raised an eyebrow. On the day that Winnie Mandela
the 1997 festival. The Festival gained a notorious reputation
died, even a reference to her in Mike van Graan’s satire, State
when a small group of revellers popped up the old South
Fracture, didn’t get a jolly howl from the audience.
African flag at the Festival and on their t-shirts. Perhaps the
Even though the Festival was still largely White, it
most offensive was when revellers boasted the slogan on their
was not unusual to see significant numbers of White and
t-shirts that proclaimed, ‘Praat Afrikaans of hou jou bek’ (Speak
Coloured people sitting at the same table socialising and
Afrikaans or keep your mouth shut).
engaging each other while their toddlers jovially played on
This year’s twenty-fourth edition of the Festival has come a
the jumping castle. Music was the magnet that was holding
long way, far from that hostile past. A more humanised Festival
them together. In the Netwerk24 venue, which housed some
has entered a democratic and constitutional South Africa with
difficult but essential conversations about the state of the
vigour, passion and with its arms, hearts and minds wide open;
nation, there was a shared passion for a South Africa that
and the Festival has given an opportunity for good Afrikaners
must be a home to all its people.
to be noticed. Oudtshoorn was full of them! At this year’s Festival, there were no old South African flags popping up. There were no stalls selling t-shirts with
26 / Creative Feel / May 2018
The Festival’s Uitkampteater project was a testament to a Festival that is fast changing. Established three years ago with funding from the Embassy of the Netherlands, the
