screenshot from Jim Chuchu’s site
PHOTOGRAPHY: jim chuchu {photography}. Photographer, animator, musician Jim Chuchu’s photography site. [via Ntwiga]
MUSIC: Iwinyo Piny: Just A Band. Music and visuals by aforementioned Jim Chuchu who is also a member of JAB. Band member Dan posts on kenyananimation blog their thinking process in creating the video. He also discusses how JAB had a rough time pitching this video to Kenyan TV stations: one Program Manager responded that they couldn’t air it as it would alienate their viewers since it was 5 years ahead of its time. You know you are doing something right when you get a response like that. [kenyanimation blog link via paula callas].
screenshot of Ian van Coller’s photo essay, “Interior Relations”
PHOTOGRAPHY: Ian van Coller: Interior Relations (portraits of black South African domestic workers taken in the homes of their white employers).
FILM: Tropa de Elite (The Elite Squad). High concept: “City of God from the police perspective, but with more brutality and violence and less nuance”. Director Jose Padilha meant to shoot this story as a follow up to his acclaimed documentary “Bus 174″, but chose to fictionalize it based on interviews and a book by 2 ex-BOPE cops. Raises some serious moral questions about how to combat out of control urban crime in townships/favelas/slums that have been criminally ignored by governments. Showed (not so) recently at Tribeca film festival, not sure when it will get wide release.
Creole. The result of the collision of Africa and Europe. In music, that collision has created what John Ryle called the soundtrack of modernity, which links the Swedish middle-aged man who loves Miles Davis with the Japanese youth who wants to be a b-boy. The result of that collision along with the almighty dollar now form part of the DNA of this thing we call global culture.
Is it the need to reconcile the technological and the human, tradition vs. modernity, civilization vs. primitivism, the seemingly mutually exclusive past and present that gives the culture created by africans all over the diaspora its vitality (soul) and its universality? Whatever, but as the sampling of the media i have been consuming in the last couple of weeks shows, the results are always interesting.
Q (”Interviewer”): Do you consider yourself a painter or a Black painter?
A (Jean-Michel Basquiat): Oh, I use a lot of colors, not just black …. It’s more a Creole, you know … what I mean by Creole is that … it’s a mix of Africa and Europe … you know in much the same way an African in Haiti speaks French.
cover of “BEYOND DESIRE” exhibition catalog
Inherent in all desire is a measure of fantasy, which guides our eye and forms or deforms our image of the ‘other’. Here fashion is a superb gauge. It is accessible, driven by unlimited fantasy, free from any form of politically correct thinking, decorative and superficial, yet, at the same time, it is deeply rooted in our cultural and social subconscious. BEYOND DESIRE shows how two cultures can each adopt the visual language of the other as their own and how their respective longings are projected through fashion and clothing in their fantasy image of this ‘other’.
gnarls barkley: going on
the styling of this video is a kind of “DRUM/soweto” meets “london working class/punk” aesthetic. the look was actually inspired by an, um, inspired fashion spread created by brooklyn photographer clayton cubitt and stylist rene garza called lagos calling
there is an non-pixelated/cleaner version of the video here.
jorge ben: ponta de lanca africano
Jorge Ben drew from the sambas of the hillside slums of Rio de Janeiro and American rhythm and blues to create an original style. He created the most organic fusion of North and South American forms of African music. This affinity is being demonstrated again by the enormous popularity of rap music in the slums, and only in the slums, of Rio. Jorge Ben was also a highly original lyricist who combined street language with images drawn from African and Christian mythology and esoteric literature.
Arto Lindsay in liner notes for “Beleza Tropical”.
Tuesday May 20th 2008, 7:29 pm
Filed under: Uncategorized
Excerpt from “Secondhand (Pepe)” a documentary by Hanna Rose Shell & Vanessa Bertozzi which explores the meaning of the word “pepe” that is given to secondhand clothing worn by working class/poor Haitians. [insert similarities to Kenyan mitumba here].
He is interested in understanding world culture with a particular emphasis on the African Diaspora, and sees his photography as a form of anthropology.
screen shot from delphine diallo’s “magic photo studio” image series
Delphine Diallo: Magic Photo Studio inspired by the work of malick sidibe, parisian delphine diallo (born to french and senegalese parents) traveled to senegal to explore her family’s cultural identity.
My photography is thus a result of non-violent communication with the victims of a violent racism. My parents - in disbelief of my written accounts - sent me after one year a pocket-size Canon Dial for my birthday asking me to send some pictures home. I had never photographed before and saw it first as my visual diary helping me to remember all the people who gave me hospitality and food in more than 400 homes over 5 years as a “vagabond”. This is my term for a hitchhiker who with no exception says yes to every invitation he receives and thus throws himself into the arms of many abusive people whom - at least I - had been brought up to avoid in my safe Danish rectory. The half-frame camera took 72 pictures on a roll, so by selling my blood plasma twice a week for $5 each time, I could afford 2 rolls of film a week. Often I hitchhiked enormous distances to go to e.g. New Orleans, where the blood banks paid $6,10, but during the last two years I made small picture books to show to better-off drivers after which I often got small donations – the highest was $30 from a businessman in Philadelphia.
Since I had to economize with the film I often sat for days with people whom I lived, not using the camera before I saw “the right face” which I felt showed the situation before the interference of a stranger – and then shot just one or two pictures. My first priority was always survival - housing and food – and the photography only my extravagant hobby.
speaking of trudging around the country taking pictures to illustrate the collective condition of a people, here are some amazing pictures taken by danish “vagabond” jacob holdt. he criss-crossed the united states in the early 1970’s for 5 years hitchhiking around with no money, no means of support, staying with over 400 mostly dirt poor rural and urban american (black, white, latino, native indian) families and individuals. in the process those people became the subjects of the 15,000 slides that he eventually took on his travels. i don’t know what to say about these pictures, i have held onto this link for a week trying to find some insightful words to describe how much they say about the crushing psychological effect of american poverty, black, white or otherwise. as kids i remember going to visit people upcountry who lived in mud homes without electricity or running water/sanitation. but i never saw the sense of hopelessness that pervades the pictures, the poverty here is as much mental as it is material. enough words.
you can put your mouth to a firehose of the imagery here (i much prefer to experience them viscerally) or view them in an online presentation format here [via the constant siege]
