Good art hits a good nerve. Public art aggravates apathy towards understanding. Put them together and you’ve got a series of statements that need no introduction. They do need a name though, and in the case of Cape Town, it does have one.
Enter Chimurenga, stalwart of artistic and cultural expression in Cape Town, Africa. And now, winner of international recognition for cultural contribution (or, a prize for it; we’ve long been fans of their fire and flint stone).
Chimurenga, an independent literary journal, has a long-standing history of publishing powerful, probing artistic expression, both literal and visual. Based in lower Long Street it operates as a mother ship of individuality under the tight command of Ntone Ejabe. He and his team have been recognised for their contribution to culture and development by The Prince Claus Fund in Netherlands.
The Prince Claus Fund recognises those in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean who excel at innovative cultural development practises. For their efforts Chimurenga received the coveted Principal Award for 2011. Chimurenga, in Prince Claus’s words offers “fresh interpretations, analyses, poetry, experimental texts and visual materials by leading creative thinkers and radical practitioners in a multiplicity of disciplines from Africa and elsewhere.”
Verbatim from Chimurenga HQ:
Chimurenga brought us the sonic intervention otherwise known as P.A.S.S. (Pan African Space Station, a music festival, a dialogue, a meeting place for like minds, and on its way back into the stratosphere soon). In 2011, while P.A.S.S took a siesta to source sustainable support, it brings us Chronic.
Chronic is a new newspaper format publication simultaneously distributed in Southern Africa, West Africa, East Africa, The USA, and Europe. October 19 was dubbed Black Wednesday by Chimurenga. It imagines a day in history, revisited and revised by a time machine called The Imagination. Intrigued? Alarmed? That’s good art. Make sure you get a copy. Something tells us this one is going to be snatched up very swiftly. More importantly check out the innovative poster campaign and tell us what you think about Chimurenga’s provocative one liners.
