The Artist in the Garden, Storytelling, Music, Theatre, Stars, History, Biography, Photography, Book Fair

AT THE  BOOK LOUNGE 1:  RED IN THE RAINBOW

I was really caught by this story in the Book Lounge newsletter.  Lynn Carneson's book is about her life as the child of committed Communists and activists Fred and Sarah Carneson and is "a story of political persecution and torture, prolonged separation and enduring love."   It sounds like part biography, part memoir: "Red in the Rainbow not only invokes Fred and Sarah's lifelong political struggles in gripping detail , but also tells poignant human story of endurance, breakdown, courage and the survival of a marriage against all odds."  The author will be in conversation with Mervyn Sloman.

Book Lounge

21 July 2010  17h30 for 18h00

AT THE BOOK LOUNGE 2. MASKED RAIDERS - IRISH BANDITRY IN SOUTH AFRICA 

Historian Charles van Onselen finds true stories that could be movie scripts -  and Masked Raiders (which "follows the wild exploits of legendary brigands")  sounds like no exception.   Even if you're not usually a reader of serious historical works, plots like this one pull you right in:

"For two decades before a railway system linked southern Africa’s principal cities in the mid-1890s, the world’s richest supplies of diamonds and gold were transported by coach and horses to distant ports for export. For Irish soldiers based at Fort Napier, Pietermaritzburg, the temptation of this fabulous wealth proved irresistible: they deserted by the score and, as members of the criminal ‘Irish Brigade’, embarked on a spree of bank, safe and highway robberies.   Startling new insights reveal how the movement of bandits across the interior helped shape the border of what was to become modern South Africa."

Charles van Onselen will be in conversation with Nigel Penn.

Book Lounge

Thursday 22    17h30 for 18h00

OPEN NIGHT AT THE CAPE TOWN OBSERVATORY

Kechil Kirkham is someone else gifted at turning a serious specialist study into a fascinating general subject.  This Saturday she will be the speaker at the Cape Town Observatory's fortnightly open night, and her subject is " a family-friendly trip around the world, finding out how other people think about the universe." If, like me, you've been wanting to take advantage of these open nights to see the historical observatory and all its machines, then this would be a very good night to go.

Saturday 24    20h00

THE ARTIST IN THE GARDEN

Kirstenbosch's free Wednesday talk this week is by Angela Read Lloyd, author of  The Artist in the Garden - the Quest for Moses Tladi.    The book (which I've seen briefly) is beautifully produced and I would love to know more about her subject.   Moses Tladi, who is known as South Africa's first black landscape painter,  had a flourishing career as an artist between 1929 and 1939, before the war, ill health and apartheid intervened and he faded into obscurity until re-discovered many decades later.

Sanlam Hall (Gate 2)  Kirstenbosch

Wednesday 21   10h30 - 11h30

Free entry, but garden entry fee applies.

Enquiries:   Cathy Abbott    021 465-6440      cathya@wol.co.za



VIOLIN CONCERT AT THE BAXTER

This Saturday in the Concert Series at the Baxter violinist Natasha Korsakova and pianist Galina Ryzhikova play Bach, Beethoven, Debussy, Kreisler and Gershwin.  The programme notes say that Korsakova who is of Russian-Greek descent has won a number of awards, including the Russian Muse award in Moscow, and the Preimos Simione Catullo Artist of the Year in Italy.

The German Süddeutsche Zeitung describes her violin-playing as a "sinfully beautiful listening experience".

Baxter Concert Hall  

Saturday  24     20h00

021 685 7880    www.baxter.co.za

LOOKING AHEAD TO A THEATRICAL WEEK

I'll be away for a few weeks from next Sunday, so I'm looking ahead a little here, and there are three plays opening next week that I would not want to miss if I were in town.  One of them is the exciting production of Waiting for Godot coming to the Fugard, featured in last week's blog.   The other two productions, see below, are opening at the Baxter on the same night.

KAROO MOOSE

Lara Foot's Karoo Moose was first produced three years ago and it already has a record of many awards and excellent reviews here and in the British press, praising it for its imagination and its freshness. "In a remote and impoverished village in the Karoo, a young girl, Thozama, struggles to survive. A violent and terrifying incident and a chance encounter with an escaped moose change her life for ever. It is a story of pain, redemption and hope, combining traditional African storytelling and magical realism."

Baxter Studio

27 July to 7 August   20h15

INXEBA LOMPHILISI  (THE WOUND OF A HEALER)

On the same night, also at the Baxter, another work by one of our most imaginative directors.

Mandla Mbothwe co-directs Inxeba Lomphilisi with Fanswa Yisa who performed in his last play, the obscure but beautiful ingcwaba lendoda lise cankwe ndlela (the grave of the man is next to the road)

This play sounds like a sequel of that one, with the same techniques of multiple stories and multimedia, and again drawing  "from African traditions and urban rituals to explore the theme of identity and belonging."     "At the heart of the piece is a very old woman who has been on the N2 for many years. She acts as a conduit for other people's stories – stories of departure and return. But she is so caught up in other people's stories that she has lost her own, and is constantly trying to catch and weave the stories together again so that they can make sense."

Flipside at the Baxter

27 July – 7 August    20h00

PRESENT AND FUTURE PHOTOGRAPHY

Still looking ahead to next week, GIPCA is hosting an exhibition in the Michaelis Galleries called reGeneration 2, an international exhibition of the work of a new generation of photographers, produced by the Musee de l'Elysee in Switzerland.  The curator Michael Ewing will speak at the opening.

These notes are from the programme of the original Swiss museum:

As the digital revolution continues its relentless advance, demolishing longstanding practices in every domain of our field, curiosity builds as to how the new generation of photographers will operate. The reGeneration project – the broadest and most enterprising survey of its kind – set out in 2005 to discover answers to these intriguing questions, while revealing emerging photography in wide-ranging fashion. Following on from the success of this exhibition shown in ten different cities across North America, Europe and Asia, this second edition turns the spotlight on 80 up-and-coming talents from 30 countries.
The Musée de l’Elysée selected the most promising candidates from some 700 entries submitted by 120 of the world’s top photography schools. The curators tried to keep an open mind throughout the selection process, whether the photographers had chosen a documentary or an artistic approach, whether they worked with film or computer, and whether they supported their work with a detailed concept or preferred shooting spontaneously.

Michaelis Galleries   Hiddingh Campus

Opening Tuesday 27 July    17h30 for  18h00

CAPE TOWN BOOK FAIR

Something else happening at the end of July is the Cape Town Book Fair, and I've done some scanning of the programme to see if this time I'd be tempted to return.   There are some things that would persuade me, including the presence of Wole Soyinka on the first morning, talking to his publisher about his memoir You Must Set Off At Dawn.   I read on Book SA that for members of a bookshop loyalty scheme like Fanatics, entrance to the Book Fair is half price.

CTICC 

Sat 31 July to Monday 2 August 

Cape Town Takes a Breather: Flowers, Theatre, Art and Books

THE DAY AFTER THE WORLD CUP FINAL

In my search today I've had in mind things that may distract and console us as we come down from our month-long high and learn to live without the special high-dosage oxygen that we've been drinking in draughts, and the riveting entertainment that we've been  fed morning, noon and night.   Many many words will have been written, and photos printed, and blogs are meant to be short. So no commentary here, just lots of thanks to all who made sure that really, truly, everybody was invited.

PUBLIC ART

On Saturday I went on a City tour of the art works adorning the new IRT bus stations;  pop in anytime and see the nicest of them, Lovell Friedman's  mosaics at the stadium in Greenpoint, and Julia Anastasopoulos's detailed child-friendly drawings at the Civic Centre stop.   It's good that the City of Cape Town is investing in art and artists, in the performing as well as the visual arts -  as world cup host city they employed about 120 diverse groups to sing, dance, and play in all the public spaces, great for the artists and great for the buzz.  When you're at the Civic Centre end of town, have a look at the gorgeous installation made of the row of trees nearby in Adderley Street. 

NEW PUBLIC SPACE

Have you tried the new walk from Somerset Road on the far side of the stadium, through the new park, straight to the old lighthouse?   It's a lovely wide  path with beautiful views and you'll find a little coffee shop sprung up between the lighthouse and the sea.

POETRY LAUNCH: BEVERLY RYCROFT'S MISSING

A poetry collection called Missing by Beverly Rycroft will be launched at Kalk Bay Books on Saturday evening.  Finuala Dowling, who will introduce the poet and lead a discussion about her work, wrote of this book:
“This astonishingly moving debut collection reads compellingly as one complete story. Missing covers the archetypal journey from sickness and near-death to transformation and hope. Rycroft wears her exquisite poetic technique lightly – through rich and deftly crafted images, the poems are profoundly inviting, readable and memorable. I could not put it down.”     Read examples of these poems on the bookshop website and on a poetry website called Peony Moon.

Kalk Bay Books   124 Main Road   Kalk  Bay
Saturday 17    18h00 for 18h30

BOOK LAUNCH:  SHORT STORIES BY HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES

Another literary conversation  that should be interesting is Diane Awerbuck talking to Henrietta Rose-Innes, author of a new collection of short stories called Homing, to be launched at the Book Lounge on Thursday.
"Diverse characters – a teenager learning to be a boyfriend, an ageing copywriter, a girl on the brink of womanhood – are animated in sparse, sparkling prose. The Cape Town they mostly inhabit is both a playground and an obstacle course, filled with menace and delight. Through this landscape, like the pigeons in the title story, they find new paths home – and are themselves transformed by the journey."

The Book Lounge   71 Roeland Street  Cape Town
Thursday 15    17h30 for 18h00

AT THE FUGARD

This is the last week of the musical theatre show for all the family,  Aesop's Fables by Isango Portobello at the Fugard Theatre, covered in a previous posting and well-reviewed by others since.
till Saturday 17   19h00  plus Saturday matinee 15h00
021 461 4554    www.thefugard.com

Something to anticipate and book for is another Waiting for Godot, coming to the Fugard for a two-week run after an international two year tour.  It features an illustrious British cast including Ian McKellen as Estragon (played by David Isaacs in the wonderful recent production at the Little.)  The director Sean Mathias described how this production came about:
"Having successfully played 14 major cities internationally, including two London seasons, with a production that has been acclaimed extensively, the Fugard Theatre then invited me to bring the troupe of actors to them and to start our Godot anew. At the Fugard we will play to an auditorium one quarter the size of other theatres we have previously played and with an ad hoc set and a new lighting design by Mannie Manim, we will re-invent our Godot wheel. The heart and soul of the production - the actors' performances, will remain intact (albeit a little stirred) but in every other sense - the physical space, the visual impact, the overall dynamics will debut at the Fugard Theatre."
The Telegraph called this  "almost certainly the funniest and most compassionate production of the play you will ever see."

29 July to 14 August
021 461 4554    www.thefugard.com

DOUBLE ENTRY AT WHATIFTHEWORLD GALLERY

Not distracting and probably not consoling, but very pertinent, is an exhibition called Double Entry by Dan Halter at Whatiftheworld Gallery. "Informed by two field trips to the Beitbridge border between Zimbabwe and South Africa, this new body of work looks at the notorious barrier and the passage Zimbabwean immigrants face in order to get into South Africa. With a touch of Halter’s own dark humour, this exhibition of video, print and installation relates to these ongoing issues."

Whatiftheworld Gallery   208 Albert Road Woodstock
till 8 August   10h00 to 17h00
021 448 1438

 

SHOPPING NEWS 1:  FRESHLY PICKED FLOWERS AT FARM PRICES

Next to the Waldorf School in Spaanschemat Road, Constantia, is a farm where you can buy freshly picked and beautiful flowers for a fraction of the price of a tired supermarket bunch.  This morning they had  lavender, summer asters, poppies, proteas, sunflowers, and others, at 12 or 15 rand for a fat bunch.  And it's such a pleasure to go there, down a country lane, past chickens and fields .... take the dirt road between the school and Peddlars restaurant.  

Monday to Friday  7h30 to 17h00, Saturday 8h00 to 13h00

Poetry, Memoir, Spoken Word, Songs

THE LAST WEEK OF THE PARTY

A short blog, because there are not too many spaces to fill in this last week of a miraculous month.  But there are some breaks and there are a few book and theatre events that I don't want to miss.




POETRY LAUNCH

The Book Lounge is hosting the launch on Wednesday of removing, the first collection of poems by Melissa Butler.  I'd love to get there, after reading this review from Finuala Dowling: "The experience of reading the poems in removing is, wonderfully, one of a late-night conversation with a warm, imaginative, thoughtful, observant and compassionate friend.  In pellucid language and deeply satisfying images of the real -- hadedas, shelves, coats, bowls, characters in Long Street, plastic bags, pigeons -- Melissa Butler manages to talk about the great questions of humanity (how we find meaning and how we know what we know) as lightly and easily as if she were tossing out a picnic blanket.  The poems in removing are memorable for their playful and inventive use of form." 
Melissa will be in conversation with Gus Ferguson.

The Book Lounge
Wednesday 7     17h30 for 18h00
    



BOOK LAUNCH: DENIS GOLDBERG'S MEMOIR

Another launch at the Book Lounge that's bound to draw a crowd is of a new memoir by Denis Goldberg, who will be there to discuss The Mission: A Life for Freedom in South Africa.
"Nelson Mandela’s comrade in the struggle, Denis Goldberg, spent 22 years in an Apartheid South African political prison from 1963 to 1985. In this memoir, Denis, the perennial optimist, writes about the human side of the often painful road to freedom; about the joy of love and death, human dignity, political passion, comradeship, conflict between comrades…and a very long imprisonment."

The Book Lounge
Thursday 8  17h30 for 18h00




POET/PERFORMANCE ARTIST STACEYANN CHIN AT THE BAXTER

Jamaican-born  poet/performance artist Staceyann Chin opens at the Baxter this week in her one-woman play Border/Clash: A Litany of Desires.  I've had very mixed experiences with spoken word performances, from the great to the horrible, so I did my homework on this one, and found that this artist is highly acclaimed.   The following notes come from a New York Times review of this play in 2005:

A part-black, part-Chinese lesbian immigrant from Jamaica, Staceyann Chin finds poetry in belonging everywhere and no place in particular.
"I was born with an otherness attached to me," said Ms. Chin.   
Now, with "Border/Clash,"  she is using her spoken-word poetry to explore and play with the false distinctions, the contradictions, the fault lines that arise around complicated identities like hers.
Her tone is sassy, rageful and sometimes softly self-mocking.... The play includes vignettes of love poems to women and free-form howls at gay-bashing and other outrages.  (But) "The 'oh, I'm a revolutionary' voice is not nuanced," she said. "I want a voice that is more informed by different kinds of things... "

The Baxter Theatre Studio
6 to 24 July 18h00 until 10 July thereafter 20h15
Written and performed by Staceyann Chin
Directed by Rob Urbinat





CEREMONIAL XHOSA SONGS AND DANCES

Showing for only three nights as part of Artscape’s Indigenous Arts Department this week is Ezethu, "a musical drama tracing the ceremonial songs and dances of the amaXhosa", featuring the Community Plough Back Movement Cultural Ensemble.   At first glance this show with its sub-title of "Preserving African Heritage and Traditions" looks a bit too didactic to be entertaining,  but I noticed in the small print that it is directed by Mandla Mbothwe which makes it a must-see on my list.  Mandla always puts the traditional and the contemporary together in ways that are strange and beautiful, as in the recent ingcwaba lendoda lise cankwe ndlela (the grave of the man is next to the road).   This time it does look straight down the line traditional - the publicity says that the music in the play "can be traced back to the tribal experiences of rural South Africa. No musical instruments are used on stage and sounds emanate only from the performer’s bodies via clapping hands and stomping feet to the rhythms of the historical songs and dances."

Artscape Theatre
Thursday 8 to Saturday 10    20h15