OCTOBER NOVEMBER 2013 programme
OVERVIEW When
What & Where
UNTIL 17/11/2013
Musik+x Museum Africa
03/10/2013 - Transatlantic Saudades 18/10/2013 GoetheonMain 06/10/2013 - African Creative Economy 09/10/2013 City Hall, Cape Town 08/10/2013 My words, my lies – my love Goethe-Institut 10/10/2013 - Once upon a Time 08/11/2013 Goethe-Institut 13/10/2013
SOUNDMINDLAB: MPHO MOLIKENG Goethe-Institut
13/10/2013
Burnt Friedman and Tlale Makhene Goethe-Institut
23/10/2013 New South African Voices: Mzansi Delights - Short Stories in South African Literature Goethe-Institut 24/10/2013 - Separ(n)ation 17/11/2013 GoetheonMain 13/11/2013 - Shifting Grounds: Reflections of 15/11/2013 National Identity The Bioscope 14/11/2013 - Adama in Wonderland 31/01/2014 by Akinbode Akinbiyi Goethe-Institut 20/11/2013
Emma’s Bliss Goethe-Institut
20/11/2013 – The 6th Drama for Life Africa Research 21/11/2013 Conference Soweto Theatre 21/11/2013 - The Nancy Holt Teleportation Device 15/12/2013 GoetheonMain 24/11/2013 Passion and Prejudice: Forbidden composers Goethe-Institut for your information: 01/10/2013 – FILM+SCHOOL 04/10/2013 The Bioscope 26/10/2013 Photography Master Class at Lagos Photo Lagos November Revolution Room Venue tba 14/11/2013 - Afritecture: Building Social Change 15/11/2013 Munich
A FAREWELL… Dear partners and friends of the Goethe-Institut, The time has come to move on and I would like to use this opportunity to say goodbye and thank you to everybody who is somehow attached to the Goethe-Institut - be it a German language student, a lover of the arts, a reader, a writer or just someone who likes to hang around at our wall-less institute on Jan Smuts or at GoetheonMain. In the last five years I experienced so many exciting, inspiring and especially happy moments. I have met wonderful people who taught me so many things. I want to thank you all for this and especially our partners for their great support and collaboration, which we hope will continue. I also want to thank all of my fabulous colleagues – the Goethe-Team – for five years of great fun. I would love to persuade everybody to come with me to Brazil, to São Paulo, but of course I also want my friend and successor, Norbert Spitz, to have the same wonderful experience that I have had here. Once I am in my new position, I will try to pull together these two southern continents that were once united as one continent millions of years ago. Dr. Katharina von Ruckteschell Director of the Goethe-Institut South Africa since 2008
…AND A WELCOME! Dear partners and friends of the Goethe-Institut, After five years, a change of directors is coming up at the Goethe-Institut Johannesburg. Katharina von Ruckteschell passes the baton to me as of 1 November 2013. As I sit at my desk in tropical Bangkok, I am trying to imagine who you, the people whom I am addressing as „dear partners and friends of the Goethe-Institut“, might be. Finding out who you all are will be an important task for me in the coming weeks and months; one which I look forward to. Even though South Africa will be the seventh country I have had the pleasure of knowing in the course of my career, my curiosity remains at the same level as that of my very first posting abroad. The unknown remains alluring and the anticipation of exploring a new country, a new culture, has not subsided. The last time I was on the African continent was exactly twenty years ago, and I am eager to see all the developments that have taken place since then. One thing that will remain the same, however, is that the Goethe-Institut will continue to be a reliable partner in the cultural discourse in South Africa. I am looking forward to my new assignment and to meeting all of you. Dr. Norbert Spitz Director of the Goethe-Institut South Africa as of 1 November 2013
MUSIC EXHIBITION
Musik+x
running until 17/11/2013 Museum Africa. Admission: Free
Photograph by Francis Oghuma.
The interactive multi-media exhibition “music+x” introduces contemporary pop, hip hop, indie and techno music from Germany. Visitors can listen to music at four “stations” as well as get information about the variety of music genres. The exhibition targets youngsters from the age of 12 onwards, but is equally interesting for an adult audience. For students learning German as a foreign language at South African high schools and universities, there is a specific group programme on offer. More information via exu@johannesburg.goethe.org.
VISUAL ARTS/FILM
Transatlantic Saudades
03/10/2013 – 18/10/2013, Opening 03/10/2013, 18H30 GoetheonMain. Admission: Free
Photograph by Kitso Lynn
Transatlantic Saudades is an experimental documentary project engaging what can be perceived as a reflective ‘off’-mirroring between Bahia (Brazil) and South Africa. Through a series of vignettes that create a matrix of associations between image, time, sense and memory, Transatlantic Saudades reflects these saudades, engaging how Bahia remembers Africa evoking a sense of interconnectedness across the Atlantic, a body of separation and linking.
CONFERENCE
African Creative Economy
06/10/2013 – 09/10/2013 City Hall, Cape Town In October 2013, Arterial Network will host its 3rd international conference on the African Creative Economy and welcome up to 400 professionals from across Africa, Europe, the Americas and Australasia. Following previous editions held in Nairobi, Kenya and Dakar, Senegal, this conference will make its biggest impact yet in both Africa and the international arena. High-level speakers and creative entrepreneurs from Africa and Europe will be presenting at the conference. The conference brings together key role-players and delegates from around the continent to formulate African-centred strategies and solutions to accelerate the growth and prominence of the creative sector in Africa. Against this backdrop, Arterial Network’s African Creative Economy Conference enables dialogue, information exchange and the strengthening of partnerships between creative communities, government, business, NGO’s and academia. The Goethe-Institut is supporting the conference with stipends for participants from the continent and will engage in the international donors panel. Furthermore, the future online portal Music in Africa will be presented in the genre related session. More information on www.acec2013.org.za.
FILM
My words, my lies – my love
08/10/2013, 19H00 Director: Alain Gsponer. English subtitles. Goethe-Institut, Auditorium. Admission: Free Until now, David Kern was a waiter and a decidedly unliterary nobody. His only true passion is Marie, who loves literature and seems to be out of reach for him. When David finds the unpublished manuscript of a novel in a second-hand night table, it seems to be his only chance to get Marie’s attention.
VIDEO INSTALLATION
Once upon a Time: New work by Marcel Odenbach & Sam Hopkins
10/10/2013 – 08/11/2013, Closing Event 08/11/2013, 18H30 Goethe-Institut, Gallery. Admission: Free
Film still from “Once upon a Time”
In 1919, the Ugandan chief Semei Kakungulu circumcised himself and his family and declared them to be Jewish, hence founding the Abayudaya, the Ugandan Jewish community centred around Mbale, in East Uganda. The community still exists and is one of a handful of African Jewish communities that are not Jewish through a hereditary connection to Israel, but through choosing to adopt a Jewish practice and belief system. Whilst in the 1920s the community followed a kind of syncretic form of Judaism, mixing the Old and New Testament together with elements from pre-Christian belief, the practice soon became aligned with mainstream Jewish customs. Today the community of approximately 3000 has an ordained Rabbi who conducts services in the synagogue and leads Torah study sessions with a group of Rabbinical students. “Once upon a Time” (2013) is a four channel video installation which features interviews with four of these Rabbinical students. Whilst of course, each narrative is highly personal and very individual there is a certain coherence that emerges across all four stories. On the one hand, there seems to be this quest for a belief system that makes sense in an almost pragmatic, everyday way, but on the other hand there is this powerful feeling of the existential nature of religion and of the spiritual resonance that Judaism has for these individuals.
MUSIC
SoundMindLab : Mpho Molikeng
13/10/2013, 16H00 Goethe-Institut, Auditorium. Admission: Free SoundMindLab is an exciting new Johannesburg-based artistic venture that provides a regular platform for innovative contemporary, electronic and experimental music, as well as creative conversations and workshops around contemporary sonic and interdisciplinary practice. Lesotho-born Mpho Molikeng is a multi-faceted artist (musician, poet, actor, dancer, painter, cultural activist/entrepreneur) who fuses African and Western instruments. His extraor-
Mpho Molikeng
dinary sounds are a combination of natural sounds, electronics, music from instruments made of recycled materials, as well as instruments such as lesiba, ’mamokhorong, setolotolo, mbira, djembe and others. His journey of teaching people how to play and listen to Basotho music has taken him round the world.
MUSIC
Burnt Friedman and Tlale Makhene
13/10/2013, 18H30 Goethe-Institut, Auditorium. Admission: Free On tour in sub-Saharan Africa, pioneer German electronic musician Burnt Friedman teams up with South African percussion legend Tlale Makhene for a one-off concert – a feast of rhythmic experimentation that will explore the boundaries between electric and acoustic, traditional and experimental, texture and melody. Burnt Friedman is one of Germany’s most established and renowned electronic musicians with a career spanning almost 40 years. Starting to publish his musical works and studio productions in 1979, Friedman began performing live around the same time, and soon attracted the attention of the Cologne electronic music scene, progressing from there to various notable music collaborations throughout the 1990s on projects with the likes of Jaki Liebezeit or Root70, and also under the band names of both Atom™ and Flanger. In 2000, Friedman launched his own record label,
Artwork by Theo Altenberg (detail)
Nonplace, with 35 releases to date. He will be releasing a new album in 2013 around the same time as his tour of four African nations in association with the Goethe-Institut takes place. Born in Soweto, Tlale Makhene moved to Swaziland at a young age and began drumming at the age of four. Today, he is one of South Africa’s most remarkable drumming talents, often referred to as “The Groove Master” because of his amazing practical and conceptual skills as polyrhythmic percussionist. Highly regarded by musicians and musical fans alike, he has been featured in and produced more than 300 jazz and world music albums and is a much sought after indigenous music teacher, musical director, session musician and performer.
BOOK READING + DISCUSSION
New South African Voices: Mzansi Delights - Short Stories in South African Literature
23/10/2013, 19H00 Goethe-Institut, Library. Admission: Free The Nobel laureate Vicente Aleixandre y Merlos once said: “A short story is a story on which one has to work a long time until it is short”. So what is the delight in writing short? Are there themes and topics that are likely to be better dealt with in the form of a short story? How important is the legacy of heroes of short stories such as Edgar Allen Poe, William Faulkner or Ernest Hemingway? How important are local heroes such as Can Themba, whose brilliant short stories have been re-celebrated lately? How different is writing a short story from writing a novel? Our New South African Voices event in October is dedicated to the short story and its meaning in the context of contemporary South African writing. We have invited two very distinctive specialists in short story writing and will discuss with them their passion for the short story as well as the limitations and advantages in exploring topics through the short form. Besides the literary ideas conveyed with the short story we also ask the question of publishing them either in book form or in magazines or newspapers. Guests of the evening will be Siphiwo Mahala whose collection of short stories „African Delights“ was published in 2011 and Diane Awerbuck, whose
short story collection “Cabin Fever” was released in the same year. Both writers are also novelists of note. The New South African Voices series is curated and facilitated by Indra Wussow and Morakabe Raks Seakhoa.
VISUAL ARTS
Separ(n)ation: Alexander Opper
24/10/2013 – 17/11/2013, Opening 24/10/2013, 18h30 GoetheonMain. Admission: Free
Photograph by Alexander Opper
Artist’s statement: This project represents Opper’s most recent pursuit, in an on-going body of artistic research, housed under the working-title of “Undoing Architecture”. Separ(n)ation discloses the ostensible harmlessness of palisade fencing, the ubiquitous readymade element so present in the way it is in/formally ‘woven’ into the fabric of the city. The project attempts to ‘collect’ and re-frame a range of fence-driven scenarios of delineation and (re)territorialisation. It aims to demonstrate and unpack a peculiar ‘curtain wall’-like phenomenon which has emerged, particularly against the silhouettes and facades of Johannesburg’s inner city, but also more generally across the larger urban-scape, over the last two decades or so. These material depictions will be translated into a series of re-manifestations and constellations which begin to ‘talk’ to and ‘cross’ each other, physically and symbolically, within the GoetheonMain project space. Separ(n)ation seeks to provoke a radical rethinking of existing discourses and clichés associated with Johannesburg’s well-known preoccupation with ‘security’ and ‘defence’. It aims to amplify the uncanny translations of difference alluded to above, focus critical views onto, into and through this material condition of off-the-shelf separation. In other words, the project explores the potentialities of the palisade as ‘thing’. Through a series of shifted, reinterpreted and congested representations of this product’s material real, the intention is for the emergence of new relations, new spaces and objects of possibility.
Goethe-institut
The Goethe-Institut is the cultural institute of the Federal Republic of Germany with a global reach. It promotes knowledge of the German language abroad, fosters international cultural cooperation and conveys a comprehensive picture of Germany. In South Africa, our focus is on strengthening cultural scenes, libraries and the teaching of German. German Language courses: The Goethe-Institut is the world-wide market leader for teaching German. Whether you want to learn German for everyday life, personal interest, your job or for university studies – the Goethe-Institut is your qualified partner. Library: The library on Jan Smuts Avenue offers German books as well as many translations of German authors, movies, music CDs and audio books. Most items can be taken out. It is open for all, Mon – Thu from 14:00 – 18:00 and Saturdays from 10:00 – 14:00 Cultural Programme: A variety of cultural events are hosted by the Goethe-Institut, from visual arts to drama, dance, literature, film, and others. Our goal is to support the local cultural scenes and strengthen pan-African dialogue through the arts. For further information visit goethe.de/johannesburg, join us on facebook.com/goethe.suedafrika or twitter.com/goethejoburg
The events in this programme are in partnership with:
INFORMATION Goethe-Institut South Africa General opening hours Monday–Thursday 8.30 am – 6 pm Friday 8.30 am – 2.30 pm Library opening hours Monday–Thursday 2 pm – 6 pm Saturday 10 am – 2 pm Language course office hours Monday–Friday 2 pm – 5.30 pm
Contact details 119 Jan Smuts Avenue Parkwood 2193 Johannesburg, South Africa Tel. +27 11 442 32 32 Fax +27 11 442 37 38 info@johannesburg.goethe.org www.goethe.de/johannesburg Rosebank The Mall
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GoeTHeonMain Contact details 245, Main Street City & Suburban Johannesburg Tel. +27 11 442 32 32 Fax +27 11 442 37 38 goetheonmain@johannesburg.goethe.org www.goethe.de/goetheonmain
General opening hours Tuesday to Saturday 10am – 4pm Thursday from 11am – 8pm Sunday 10am – 2pm
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Arts on Main
M2 East Directions to GoetheonMain from the M1 Get onto the highway M1 South. Keep left (east) where the M1 forks onto the M2 towards the City, Durban and Selby. Take the Joe Slovo turn off, keep right. Take the Market St turn off, keep right. Cross through the traffic lights on Interchange. Continue straight onto Commissioner Street. Turn right at the 1st set of traffic lights onto Betty St. Take the first right into Fox St. and drive to the top of Fox, where you will find parking. Arts on Main is the building on the corner of Berea and Main street next to the Highway. GoetheonMain is in the grey building on Main Street.
FILM
Shifting Grounds: Reflections of National Identity
13/11/2013 – 15/11/2013 The Bioscope. Admission: Free In July 2011, Darryl Els, the coowner and programme director of The Bioscope Independent Cinema, was invited by the Arsenal: Institut für Film und Videokunst e.V in Berlin and the Goethe-Institut to participate in the Living Archive project. Nearly 50 years after its Scene of “Come Back, Africa” (1950s)
founding, the Arsenal selected more than 40 participants to
reimagine their film archive of 8000 titles, placing an emphasis on film archive work as a contemporary artistic and curatorial practice. After two years of research, the projects were presented in June 2013 at the Living Archive festival. Els’ project entitled “Shifting Grounds: Reflections of National Identity in the Archive” takes the first film in the archive, “Come Back, Africa”, which was filmed secretly in Johannesburg by Lionel Rogosin in the late fifties, as a starting point and maps the concept of national identity to certain films in the collection as they relate to the themes of mobility, landscape and memory. In doing so, the project explores how the Arsenal film archive functions as a site of contestation of nation and national identity through both the actual film texts and the way in which the circulation processes produce counter-publics and alternative narratives of nationhood. More information on www.thebioscope.co.za / www.arsenal-berlin.de
EXHIBITION
Adama in Wonderland by Akinbode Akinbiyi
14/11/2013 – 31/01/2014, Opening 14/11/2013, 18h30 Goethe-Institut, Gallery Renowned Nigerian photographer Akinbode Akinbiyi has for some years focused his output on mega-cities, especially those on the African continent, including work on Cairo, Lagos and Kinshasa. The body “Adama in Wonderland” was developed during stays in the city in 2012 and 2013. The artist describes the work as ‘a wander through the contested streets of Johannesburg looking for, searching for its essential essence. Extremely fine gold dust floating ever so ephemerally in the evening twilight, down
Parkhurst, Johannesburg, 2012
Johannesburg, 2012
the grid-patterned streets of Downtown, out into the southern suburbs and up and away into the northern counterparts, and in no way forgetting the equally contested streets of the western and eastern suburbs.’
FILM
Emma’s Bliss
20/11/2013, 19H00 Director: Sven Taddicken. English Subtitles Goethe-Institut, Auditorium. Admission: Free Emma’s Bliss is a romantic tragic-comedy that takes place in contemporary rural Germany. Max, a used car salesman, has been diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer. Faced with the knowledge that he doesn’t have much longer to live, he impulsively steals money and a flashy Jaguar from the dealership and runs away to Mexico. Meanwhile, we are introduced to Emma, an eccentric young woman who lives alone and breeds pigs. When Max crashes the Jag into her farm, Emma rescues him and promptly falls in love with the fated fugitive. Max’s plan to die in Mexico fades under the influence of Emma’s lust and charming, forthright manner, and her pig farm becomes his paradise.
CONFERENCE
The 6th Drama for Life Africa Research Conference
20/11/2013 – 21/11/2013 The unfinished business of truth and reconciliation: Arts, Trauma and Healing. Soweto Theatre The Drama for Life (DFL) Africa Research Conference constitutes one of the foremost platforms for applied drama, drama therapy, arts education, research and practice on the African continent and aims to create an
inter-continental and international dialogue about the significant role applied drama and theatre can play in social transformation. In 2012, the conference explored the role of applied drama and theatre interventions in conflict and post-conflict societies. This year’s 6th DFL Africa Research Conference will be exploring the role of the arts in societies that have sought to engage in processes of truth and reconciliation, transition and change in post-conflict contexts. The conference will ask the questions: what role can the arts play in speaking back to the “unfinished business” of societies that have committed themselves to significant change, and how can the arts contribute toward a deeper, more meaningful and long lasting process of healing within a context of trauma? More information on www. dramaforlife.co.za
INSTALLATION
The Nancy Holt Teleportation Device
21/11/2013 – 15/12/2013, Opening 21/11/2013, 18h30 GoetheonMain. Admission: Free
The Centre Of The World (2012).
View of the sky from the ‘Up and Under’ central tunnel with security grid (2012)
Robyn Cook and Lauren von Gogh are the Sober & Lonely Institute for Contemporary Art, and have been loosely operating in Joburg, Durban, Los Angeles, Haukijärvi, Beetsterzwaag and the Internet for the past two and a half years. In 2008, they started experimenting with telepathy, just before being separated by 13 468 km for two years. They had already been thinking each others thoughts for four years before that, and Lauren’s grandfather was a magician that specialized in telepathic and hypnotic performances - so the practice of telepathy came naturally to them. Having thought transferal as a secondary means of communication for when they are separated by long distances has proved useful, and comedic at the same time. It would, however, be even more beneficial to be able to quickly, and cost effectively transport themselves from the bottom of Africa to wherever they need to be. They’re working on figuring this out - connecting portals to portals - and making new connections in relevant places. In April 2012, they discovered what is thought to be one of the main portals. It is a Nancy Holt land art piece in the Finnish countryside, called Up & Under. At the end of August, Sober & Lonely invited the
audience of the Transcontinental Express to build their own portals to connect with them in Johannesburg for their project at GoetheonMain. This November, Sober & Lonely will build the Nancy Holt Teleportation Device at GoetheonMain, attempting to teleport objects, animals, and people to Up & Under, the Mojave Desert, and various other portals that may be open. Free tours will be available to teleport to Up and Under in the village of Pinsiö in the west of Finland, and to explore The Quietest Place on Earth, The Nancy Holt Teleportation Device Information Kiosk, The Twilight Room, The Kahvila Konditoria (with soapy cake), the Nancy Holt Teleportation Device Souvenir Shop, and the Centre of the World.
MUSIC
Passion and Prejudice: Forbidden composers
24/11/2013, 17H00 Goethe-Institut, Auditorium. Admission: Free The Goethe-Institut, in collaboration with the Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre and the Rosa Luxembourg Foundation, presents a programme of music by major Jewish composers whose music was banned by the Nazis: Mahler, Schoenberg, Berg, Zeisl and Weill. Performed by acclaimed South African pianist Jill Richards and tenor Peter Lurie, the programme will focus on works written in Germany and Austria from the turn of the 20th century until the start of World War II. This intensely rich cultural period was a time when the social order was undergoing radical transformation, ending with the subsequent rise of fascism. The works selected for this programme reflect personal issues that are relevant to humankind in general, while the historical context continues to remind us of the dreadful specificities of the Nazi era. The works in this programme will connect with our country’s context with parallels of racism, as Nazi ideology was enthusiastically embraced by part of the South African population during that era. These themes will be explored within the concert.
FILM
Film + School
01/10/2013 – 04/10/2013 The Bioscope, 286 Fox St, Maboneng Precinct The Bioscope FILM + SCHOOL Series is a film awareness and appreciation initiative by the Bioscope Independent Cinema in partnership with the Goethe-Institut South Africa. The central aims of the initiative are to introduce young learners to the art of filmmaking, to spark interest in a wide range of topics and to encourage discussion. The last edition of FILM+SCHOOL Cinema Education programme for 2013
will showcase a series of films about the city of Johannesburg. Through screenings and facilitated discussions, students will get the chance to see their city on screen and engage with various issues such as migration, housing and gentrification. South Africa has a very rich and strong tradition of documentary filmmaking which the selected films reflect. The programme aims to introduce students to the role that documentary films play in society, the way in which films are able to deepen our understanding of the world in which we live as well as to use the films as starting points for a broader discussion of the issues that are raised. For more information and bookings contact Puleng Plessie: 076-2532530, pulengplessie@gmail.com.
PHOTOGRAPHY MASTER CLASS
Lagos Photo
26/10/2013 Lagos, Nigeria The Photographers’ Master Class is an ongoing programme of workshops initiated by Simon Njami and the Goethe-Institut in 2009, which travels to major contemporary art events on the continent annually. It brings together young photographers with established curators and photography professionals to give critical feedback on the photographers’ work, as well as encourage professional contact and network building between photographers in the Sub-Saharan region. This year it is realized during the opening week of Lagos Photo and with the support of the Goethe-Institut in that city. More information on www.lagosphotofestival.com
EXHIBITION + SYMPOSIUM
Afritecture: Building Social Change
14/11/2013 – 15/11/2013 Architekturmuseum der TU München Contemporary architectural practice in Africa is witness to many new and innovative approaches in the area of socially committed building: schools, marketplaces, hospitals, cultural centers, sports facilities and assembly halls. It is these public buildings and commonly used spaces in particular where signs of new utility and architectural concepts are made manifest. In its exhibition AFRITECTURE: Building Social Change, the Architekturmuseum der TU München will highlight projects which carry a particular emphasis of having been initiated by architects whose conceptualization incorporates global relationships, in addition to local culture and individual social groups. By taking into account ecological, economic and social aspects, several architects have developed sustainable approaches and solutions to some of the continent’s most pressing design challenges. The exhibition
Copyright Matthias Kestel, Fachgebiet Holzbau der TU M端nchen
showcases over twenty projects from ten countries within Sub-Saharan Africa. Symposium: What relevance does socially committed architecture have in Africa and what can the Northern hemisphere learn from the buildings constructed in Mali, Nigeria, Kenya, Rwanda and South Africa? These and other questions will be discussed in the symposium that will take place at the Pinakothek der Moderne M端nchen. The Architekturmuseum der TU M端nchen together with the Goethe-Institut Johannesburg and the Bayerische Architektenkammer (Bavarian chamber of architects) will hold a three day panel discussion, featuring international guest speakers to address central aspects of the exhibit, such as participation and urbanization.
ONLINE INFORMATION PLATFORM
Music in Africa
The Music in Africa Project aims to establish a music information and networking online portal dedicated to the African music sector. Initiated in 2011 during a conference organized in Johannesburg, the project has grown in leaps and bounds. The aim of Music in Africa is to respond to the need for reliable information and networking among music professionals in Africa, while also contributing towards improved collaboration among artists on an international level to enhance awareness of African music scenes. The first Music in Africa Foundation Meeting was held in Nairobi, Kenya. A crucial step in the advancement of the Music in Africa Project, the meeting facilitated the adoption of a constitution and the election of a Board of Management for the future pan-African Music in Africa Foundation. This development as well as the appointment of regional editors has put us firmly on our path towards launching the on-line information and networking portal during the first quarter of 2014. In the interim, presentations about the future Music in Africa portal will be given at three significant music conferences: the African Creative Economy (Cape Town), WOMEX (Wales) and SIMA (Yaounde, Cameroon). The Music in Africa Project is an initiative by Siemens Stiftung and the Goethe-Institut together with partners from across Africa. The GoetheInstitut and Siemens Stiftung support the establishment and development of the portal. More information on www.themusicinafricaproject.net.
WORKSHOP
Revolution Room
The Revolution Room project is a VANSA initiative which seeks to explore new ways in which museums as public institutions can project themselves more forcefully into the public realm, through interventions in ‘common space’ developed out of collaborations between artists, citizens and museum professionals. The project will involve curators working with artists and local collaborators in developing projects in Cosmo City, a post-apartheid urban settlement in the north-west of Johannesburg. The project will also seek to forge institutional linkages, collaborations, and a community of practice between South African, African and European institutions and organisations, born out of the practical experience of developing a shared project. Participating organisations from outside South Africa will include Institute at the University of Zurich (Switzerland) and The Centre for Art and Urbanistics (Germany). Within South Africa, the project will seek to engage with a number of institutions which are concerned in different ways with managing the interface between art and diverse publics. These include museums, universities and galleries. A project development workshop and public presentation will be convened in November 2013 in relationship with the WITS School of Arts Curatorial Talks programme. For more information and to register, please contact info@vansa.co.za.
YOUTH MEDIA PLATFORM
Keleketla
Keleketla! Library is an independent library and information centre that serves the Johannesburg inner city community. Situated at the historic Drill Hall, the space aims to nurture and grow an audience for the arts by providing experimental platforms for cultural exchanges and knowledge creation, discussions and personal study. The library also intervenes into the school curriculum through its after school programme that invites participation within the library and the schools. In its arts in education activities starting from the last quarter of 2013, Keleketla will continue to work related to the Treason Trial that took place at the Drill Hall. The project is supported by the National Heritage Council and the process will engage selected schools in Limpopo and Gauteng. A second edition of the educational publication “56 Years to the Treason Trial” will be produced, that uses history and art as catalyst for engagement with social, economic and political conditions of young people and will align the learner activities sections to the national curriculum. The Goethe-Institut supports Ketleketla as an organization and its activities as an important creative space in downtown Johannesburg. More information on www.keleketla.org.
Front cover: Capture of “326 | 203 | 301 | 656” – Sam Hopkins and Marcel Odenbach (2013) Design: www.prinsdesign.co.za
among others Picha (DRC), Microsillons (Switzerland), The Art Education