Screenshot of Missoni Resort 2011 collection on the style.com site.
Missoni Resort 2011 Collection. Mod fashion with a nod to “tribal” (Ndebele) style.
(via the always interesting katebomz tumblr)
Icon: Former model Iman Abdulmajid is set to receive the Council of Fashion Designers of America 2010 Fashion Icon award. Although Iman made her mark in the “frivolous” world of good looks, the impact of her presence there and on the wider world of the African/black visual image is undeniable.
Refugee: In above puff piece, former refugee Iman makes a great point about what women displaced by the Congo conflict need. No, not charity but help to end the war (as funded by conflict minerals from that region), so that they can re-build their communities. Not sure if the whole fair-trade cellphones concept will take off, though.
Thanks to a post on Kate Bomz’ lovely tumblrlog I happily obliterated a recent Friday evening discovering the culture of the Swenkas of South Africa. Swenkas?:
The swenkas are a small group of Zulu working men which formed in South Africa following the abolishment of Apartheid.
These well-dressed men are proud and considered to serve as an inspiration to others. On Saturday nights, these men leave their work clothes behind and don highly fashionable quality suits to impress a judge, who is a randomly picked. Traditionally, the prize for the most stylish suit is cash, but on special occasions such as Christmas, the winner may receive a goat or a cow. This traditional fashion show still happens today, but it is unclear as to precisely when it was instigated. The men follow certain set values of Swanking, such as physical cleanliness, sobriety and above all self-respect.
It is not clear what the precise roots of the swenka culture are. There is the acapella Iscathamiya music, where the performers, inspired by African-American ragtime/jazz fashions took a sense of formality and elegance. Also like migrants everywhere else the workers needed to buy swanky outfits for their return home to show those they had left behind that they had made it in the big city, regardless of what the daily reality was (is) of life in the mines, the construction sites, and white homes where they worked. Regular competition seems to have raised it all into an art form and a subculture.
The three video clips below highlight the various threads that make up Swenka.
Mini-feature on the Zulu ISICATHAMIYA choir competitions in Johannesburg
“artsworld” feature on Iscathamiya choral and Swenka fashion competitions in Johannesburg
Trailer for 2004 documentary “The Swenkas” by Danish director Jeppe Ronde. Synopsis here
Screen shot from Vice magazine site featuring the Swenkas. © M. Shoul
See also: Vice magazine: Swanky Swenkas Snip from article from Adolphus Mbuyisa on swenking:
I am one of the organizers of the Joburg swenkas. I don’t know how many suits I own, maybe 20 or 30. If I see a suit I like, I simply must have it. I also have lots of shoes, ties, and shirts. It is important for everything to match if you want to win a competition.
….
I live in a room in Soweto. My family is very supportive of me and my clothes. They don’t mind that I spend so much money on suits—they are proud of me and they like it when I look smart.
Screen shot from designer Paul Smith’s web site
Speaking of Swankiness, See Also: Underscoring the power of the imagination in subcultures like the Swenkas and sapeurs, fashion designer Paul Smith has a new fashion line for spring/summer 2010 called “Mainline” influenced by Congo Brazzaville’s sapeurs:
See Also: Through all this I can’t help but think of Hugh Masekela’s song “Coal Train” (aka “Stimela”) about a train carrying men from the hinterlands of southern Africa (all of Africa these days?) who uproot themselves from their homes, lands and loves in the pursuit of dreams of wealth and comfort. The dreams that crash into the reality of migrant life and that are rekindled in Swenka fashion and Iscathamiya music/performance.
Hugh Masekela: “Coal Train Live”
Screenshot from Spiegel Online site photo gallery: “Action Flicks and Love Stories”
Spiegel Online article and photo gallery on Nollywood. Bet you did not know that it is the second largest employer in the country after the oil industry. Snip:
Nollywood is the massive, pulsating film industry in Nigeria, which the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has declared the world’s second-largest film industry, after India’s Bollywood, based on the number of films produced. Shooting past Hollywood without the world noticing, Nollywood has made it to second place with films about family, love and honor, about AIDS, prostitution and oil, and about ghosts and cannibals.
In other words, films about Africa.
Hat Tip: Scarlettlion via Twitter
Screen shot from BBC site of David Adjaye’s African urban architecture photos. © D. Adjaye
ARCHITECTURE: Tanzanian-born star-chitect David Adjaye has a show at London’s Design Museum. Urban Africa contains over 2000 images that he has taken over the last 10 years of the civic/commercial/residential architecture of all of Africa’s 53 capital cities. In a BBC interview [audio: interview starts around 5:40] he talks about how people have strong visual connections to the wild landscapes of the continent, but are a little baffled when told about about how cosmopolitan the cities are. The show’s goal is to redress this situation.
I wish I could go see this show. These days when I go back to Nairobi, I see the architecture in a different way. There are many old buildings that intrigue me (designed to address a certain notion of africanness and local climate needs) and new ones that leave me aghast (designed to mimic some bland, uncreative notion of modernity).
PHOTOGRAPHY: See also: Flickr: Nairobi Architecture
Cine Afrique building, Zanzibar. Photo by your humble servant © K. Mucoki
Vodou in Brooklyn: Audio slideshow featuring the images and commentary of photojournalist Stephanie Keith who has documented a series of vodou parties involving Haitian immigrants who live in New York City. [via the never boring boing boing]
Trailer for the Waris Dirie biographical film “Desert Flower”
FILM: Desert Flower. Waris Dirie’s book of her escape from Somalia, rise to supermodel superstar-dom and later fight against female genital mutilation gets the Hollywood treatment. Ethiopian Liya Kebede stars.
Screenshot from Suresh Natarjan’s portfolio site on the Behance Network
PHOTOGRAPHY: Suresh Natarajan: Tanishq Aarka. India meets Africa.
Back in February, the Jamaican Broadcasting Commission banned from the radio songs that reference “daggering” and other acts of sex and violence. The controversy set to the one-drop reggae of the “Indiscretions Riddim” (featured on Heatwave’s Early Warming mixtape).
Indiscretion: Konshens – Straight Forward (Indiscretions Riddim)
But tonite mi just wah dagga
I’m a straight forward kind of bredda
Mi know mi seh wi coulda just chill tonight
But when mi see your body
Girl mi cyah badda
Mi just wah dagga
And leff all a di talking fi tomorrow
Tonite I wanna make you my baby madda (wooooh)
Tonite mi just wah dagga
Censorship: Busy Signal – Beep (Indiscretions Riddim)
just through di beep(beep)
I and I cyaan speak
warn to freedom of speech
just through di beep(beep)
we nah express weself inna di song
and now di beep fulfill it
just through di beep(beep)
I and I cyaan talk
cyaan tell mi fans everything inna mi thoughts
dem only waan mi music play pon sidewalk
certain things dem nah bright cause
“The BLK JKS homecoming slideshow” audio slide show from the Mail & Guardian site.
Music: BLK JKS are back in the States to tour in support of the debut album “After Robots” out now. Rolling Stone has called them “Africa’s best new band” and artists to watch in 2009. Here is a sampler track from their new album:
Photographers I Like: Speaking of BLK JKS, you’ve probably seen a tall gentleman on/back stage at their shows taking pics of the performances. Said gentleman would be Kwesi Abbensetts, an art photographer who beautifully captures the creative vibe of Brooklyn. He posts his work on the photoblog “Spaceship George“.
Screenshot from “Oroma” a photo essay on Mike Schreiber’s site. © M. Schreiber
Photography, more: Mike Schreiber, Oroma Speaking of photographers, here as some cool images of Oroma Elewa the editor and creative force of nature behind the magazine/site pop’africana (which site I have been criminally silent about). Mike Schreiber is another Brooklyn-based photographer with great work, check out his esays on M.I.A. as well as other music portraits he has shot on his site.
Promise of Africa Collective at New York Fashion Week
FASHION: Speaking of fashion, herewith highlights from the Arise: Promise of Africa Collective Spring/Summer 2010 show at the recently completed New York Fashion Week. It featured togs by David Tlale, Eric Raisine, Tiffany Amber and Jewel by Lisa.
Democracy in Dakar Trailer from Nomadic Wax on Vimeo.
Politics: “Democracy in Dakar” The intersection of hip hop, activism and politics.
African Underground: Democracy in Dakar is a groundbreaking documentary film about hip-hop youth and politics in Dakar Senegal. The film follows rappers, DJs, journalists, professors and people on the street at the time before during and after the controversial 2007 presidential election in Senegal and examines hip-hop’s role on the political process. Originally shot as a seven part documentary mini-series released via the internet – the documentary bridges the gap between hip-hop activism, video journalism and documentary film and explores the role of youth and musical activism on the political process
“Nosotros los de la Saya” (“We of the Saya”) from AbNomad Media on Vimeo.
Human Rights: “Nosotros los de la Saya” (“We of the Saya”) Afro-Bolivians struggle for official recognition.
WE OF THE SAYA (pronounced “sigh-yah”) is a feature-length cultural and social documentary about the marginalized Afro-Bolivian community, and their struggle to achieve recognition as a legitimate ethnic group in the new Bolivian constitution. In addition to enriching culture and music, this film will present the rise of an Afro-Bolivian civil rights movement. “We of the Saya” is an inspirational story about the Afro-Bolivian movement (and all Afro-Descendant movements in a broader sense), and their resistance to suffer more years of continuous marginalization.This is an inspirational story about self-determination and seizing the moment in order to improve a community’s way of life.
(In Spanish with subtitles)
Trailer for the film “Thomas Sankara, Upright Man”, now publicly available at California Newsreel
California Newsreel makes library of African film available to the public
California Newsreel is making this collection of feature films available directly to consumers — for the first time in its history, the Library of African cinema will be widely available on DVD for $24.95 each.
The collection includes widely celebrated feature films such as Ousmane Sembene’s “Faat Kine” (2001), Djibril Diop Mambety’s “La Petite Vendeuse de Soleil”, also known as “the Little Girl Who Sold the Sun” (1999), Zézé Gamboa’s “The Hero” (2004), Newton Aduaka’s “Ezra” (2007), Moussa Sene Absa’s “Ça Twiste à Poponguine” (1993), Joseph Gai Ramaka’s “Karmen Gei” (2001) and Mohamed Camara’s “Dakan” (1997).
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